The Worcester Public Schools before Council for FY24

 with a reminder of all of this

While we listen to the Fire Department, here are the images that I posted this afternoon on Instagram! 

And the presentation that the superintendent will be presenting is here. 

I'm not taking any notes on this, but here's a note you'll need:

"how can we work together as a city...to go to the state and say 'we want to find a solution that can work' and we need to do this together to find something that can work."

Colorio: asks what enrollment is
"it looks like we haven't been at 24,318 in over a decade"
argues that the numbers don't bear out an enrollment increase; which Allen notes our forecasting does
Colorio: how many new teachers? 75
How many new administrators? "the net increase is five"
Colorio: can you run down recent investments we've made in the schools in various areas?
McGourthy: don't necessarily have a comprehensive list
with that, the city carries debt; $15M capital debt service
(as a reminder, that is three cents of every dollar)
Colorio asks where the teachers are going

Russell: task hanging over the whole city's head
as well as the day to day operations, "from what I can see she's doing a great job"
"but that being said, it's not secret that I've been advocating for things for district 3 for a long time"
"I want to be perfectly clear that I'm not trying to micromanage anything" in city government 
"relaying concerns" from neighborhood
"but the question is where do we go...the question is could we doing something on a temporary basis"
"how many times do we look at a Parks Department construction...and get on a path to where we can correct these items"
going to request a detail report about traffic concerns 
has asked the principal, Mr. Allen, Mr. Hacker...for what it's going to take to rectify the traffic and parking around Roosevelt and Burncoat
Details around where the $3.5M would go
"and if that's the case, that's the case..."
"is there anything we can do on temporary basis"
asks if there is anything in the budget addressing these issues
Allen: looking at different options that wouldn't be those in the full ideal solution for the school
Russell: is there anything temporary thing, leasing spaces
Allen: can certainly look at that: believe the issue is the traffic loop and not the parking per se
Russell: elevate issues, look at options
"if we're going to put a number in multi-millions in the parking issue, it's probably not going to see the top of the pile"
Worcester East Middle School: how are we going with that?
Allen: cost of window replacement is for any window deemed to be inoperable
"where we will have funding struggles is where the project cost will trigger ADA upgrades"
Russell: how much is it?
Allen: will know when it fills that Gap
Russell: have you considered applying for a waver?
Allen: has been discussed
Russell: is the district going to spend the money on something else
Allen: the district is committed to doing the windows at Worcester East Middle
Russell: have there been specific asks?
Monárrez: have to come together and look at all of our needs
Look at enrollment changes 
"need to work closer with each other on all of the work"
"We need to have a strategy to ask our state to have other ways of funding districts as large as Worcester"
"a building will get to a point where the MSBA won't consider an accelerate repair" for a building because it is too run down 
Allen: "MSBA has told us that Worcester East Middle is a core replacement"
Monárrez: funds one core project at a time
Russell: "I agree with the superintendent, it's clearly something we need to work together on"
"what generation are we going to be talking about when we're building a new East Middle School"
and apply that to several others
Petty: seven millions sitting there...asks what one million in bonding gets us
I have no idea what he's talking about here
McGourthy: one million gets us ten million
Petty: I think working together we can get through this

Toomey: thanks superintendent
had a thought to use Stop and Shop parking lots which would mean even more students would walk across the street
safety audit: wondering when the Council will see them
Monárrez: once received, it will be shared with the School Committee, which will then make it public
"perhaps available at our July meeting or August"
Toomey: asking about fire alarm replacement and cameras (she's reading the capital budget)
Allen: those have been ongoing projects that we've been dealing with as they come up
expect these and others to be addressed in the findings
training, policies, practices, protocols
Toomey: repairs to Claremont front entrance
paving...could you let us know what that entails
Allen: Claremont walkway and driveway has been unusable for some years; has taken this long to get into the capital budget
Toomey: notice that fuel oil is going down due to 
Allen: still working through RFP process
Toomey: there's an increase in rent and quizzes both
understand that there is a dedicated gas station and how does funding work
Allen: Pullman Street, gas comes through the city
Toomey: are you using municipal aggregation?
Allen: have net metering credits; will defer to the ctiy
Toomey: can I get a detailed list of administrators and salaries?
Petty doesn't vote the request

Rivera: excited to see an increase of wraparound coordinators
overdue to look at a building maintenance plan
"what might have needed a bandaid needs surgery...it's really an equity issue"
concerned to see UPCS roof as late a date as that
Allen: most of the projects before this were windows, and now are roofs
"have to do bandaids until they get accepted into MSBA" (assuming they bring the program back)
Rivera: are we looking at growth for schools?
new housing by Canterbury, by Chandler
are we prepared, are we looking for the growth of children coming into these schools?
Monárrez: exactly what City Manager and I have spoken about a few times
housing development we know about, what is coming, so we're not waiting til our schools are bursting
Rivera: UPCS not equipped for any type of physical limitations
also concerned about our playgrounds: getting outdoors
hard if in the schools we don't even have that capability
Woodland has to take turns going out; "definitely a huge equity issue"
Allen: working with some community organizations to look at Woodland
the challenge there is the lack of space beyond what is on the footprint
the parking lot but creates traffic and parking issues
don't have a solution at this time
Rivera: these things weren't looked at when these spaces were created
vocational education: hope to shift it
shortage in the workforce
questions equity in AP access at Claremont and UPCS
have there been conversations with other colleges like Clark does
Monárrez: continuum of college and career a position now
formalizing some of these agreements that have been happening, now from district level
Rivera: work on diversity, equity, and inclusion
refugee population, including unaccompanied minors
speaks of a family that had a disheartening experience with a school
have seen labels put on our kids
"under the right administration, these kids just fly"
Monárrez: thank for sharing story
as part of the restructuring this school year, based on what the families said and best practice
hired directors of family and community engagement
very early on in conversation: what is WPS going to do for the needs for social justice
"will continue to train up people"
Chief Diversity Officer was to diversify workforce; moving forward, position has been reworked but will as Chief Equity Officer will be "guardian of equity" ensuring leading though an equity lens
training up leaders including on unconscious biases
equity doesn't sit with one person

King: last comments are music to my ears
talk a little bit about any cost savings that were realized
has cost savings on transporation been quantified?
Allen: about 3 and a half million a year
some put back into transportation for service improvements
King: families having piece of mind
looking forward to you guys being able to experience that
daughter at Chandler Magnet
wondering if there is any cost savings due to La Familia merging into Chandler Mag
Allen: saving the lease cost and the cost of a principal (if looked at in isolation)
King: ADA upgrades 
issue of equity: support Fair Share amendment 
"is there any sort of calculus going on or strategy currently in play for the cityside and schoolside to work on access to that funding?"
Batista: currently no strategy, but that would be a conversation 
King: have heard a little about capital funding, increases of SOA, ESSER, city contribution increase
"incumbent upon us...there are times we have to intersect to advocate for our kids"
what sort of staffing and costs will there be for the Chief Diversity Officer?
Monárrez: there right now are budgeted for four additional coaches, $350K
King: want to talk about administrative positions
outside of schools, we know waitlists for clinical resources
good to see nurses, psychologists
those infrastructure, coping positions, impact the public health outside
"that comes from this administration and the School Committee"
Worcester Tech "had become a prep school": concern about equity of access
Rec Worcester: school side took on some of that, as I recall
what that amount is
McGourthy: WPS provided support for Rec Worcester programs going on in their buildings
believe that is the number that is carried within the WPS budget itself
during the pandemic, that changed
Allen: on school side, it was $100, 000; now not allocating funds
King: not sure what happened with earmarks
Batista: trying to sustain and support what we were currently doing
expanded too fast without the structure in place to support it
King: expect some sort of intersection next school year
Batista: currently focusing on summer; next year would be part of conversation with superintendent and youth office
King: safety audit
asks what happened with prior safety audit a couple of years ago
Allen: the recommendations were not adopted
one of the reasons that we needed to reengage at this point
King: push for clinical support
Monárrez: four different providers in schools
ESSER funding; then SOA will come into play
King: resources for mental health for youth in community
Batista: ARPA dollars
million dollars for crisis response team
Shannon dollars for preventative measures and intervention work
think Rec Worcester itself is such a program
King: how many dollars are we providing over required, if you take into account the loan, OPEB contribution...(this isn't a thing)
is there a round number you can give me 
McGourthy: FY24: $124M; city is contributing $138M; debt service of $15M; doesn't include OPEB contribution
"there's not one clean number...when you look at it
"upwards of $30M above the required contribution...but because of the required contribution, that is expected to be $1.5M above required"
King: former city manager would decide a certain number of dollars over net school spending "and he would hang his hat on that"
Batista: am familiar, $1M, depending on resources
King: free cash, have in past given funding "for books" (when? what?)
When was the last time?
Batista: just done in October
King: once that goes over, the School Committee figures out what to do with that?
Batista: that's correct
King: kudos on middle school coaches
city has a lot of competing issues
appreciate joint committee last Monday; looking forward how we can all do better together
"I think Roosevelt is unique"

Petty: long night, where the issues are
"especially for the city to put more money into schools"
commend superintendent for the infrastructure you've put into place

account passes

Worcester updates

I am behind on these...apologies.

There was an article in the weekend edition of the Worcester Telegram and Gazette stemming from what appeared to be a lengthy interview with Superintendent Binienda and School Safety manager Rob Pezzella last week. The thrust of the article, clearly an attempt to put controversy over the superintendent's tenure (and contract) to rest, is where the Worcester schools struggle, so do others, and regardless, the superintendent is working on it. The comparisons in the article rather missed the ways--and there are several--in which Worcester is an outlier (and not in positive directions), some of which have also been covered by the T&G. 
This led to a reflective piece by Clive McFarlane noting that much of what would seem to be necessary, and in some cases what Superintendent Binienda is now saying, are items put forward by Superintendent Boone, which were not popular by many of the same parties now defending Superintendent Binienda, leading to the question of if, in fact, the superintendent is in a position to carry such needs out.
Councilor Rivera, councilor of District 4 and the sole Latinx elected official city official, put out a statement regarding the situation, which reads in part:

More recently, legal actions by former Worcester Public School employees challenged my conscience to speak out rather than continuing to sit waiting...Ultimately I joined the public call because it felt all other possible routes to bringing about dialogue and change had failed.

This evening, she spoke at the Worcester School Committee, reading much of these statements, calling for the superintendent to "listen to the call" for change.
You can also read much of this in Bill Shaner's weekly "Worcesteria".

More officers in Worcester schools?

I haven't said anything about Superintendent Binienda's endorsement of a police officer at Claremont Academy in part because Councilor Rivera nailed it on why this is a terrible idea.
Only because I see this being reported incorrectly: note that WPS discipline trended back upwards again last year. 
There is absolutely no question what impact having police in schools has on schools like Worcester's.

Although school policing and other security measures harm many students without increasing safety, they do provide one powerful benefit: making the loudest voices feel safer, according to Mallett. "In suburban, white schools that have had positive relationships with police, parents and teachers feel safer," Mallett says, "and it doesn't affect crime or school shootings in a positive way, but it doesn't make it worse."
However, that feeling of safety doesn't translate to students, even white ones. Schindler notes that research shows that a heavy police presence in schools actually has the effect of making kids feel less safe. "The most important thing is to identify where they feel comfortable behaving with adults, where they can share concerns, and where they can be identified if they need help," he says.

Do note how police officers in Worcester schools largely are funded (I covered this as part of my look at WPS FY19 last year; scroll down): most of the funding is city money spent through the city budget, credited as school funding. That has been over a million dollars a year for several years now. Those funds are never seen by the Worcester School Committee; they just show up on the schools' End of Year report "counted" as school spending. The School Committee could, of course, tell the superintendent this is a bad idea; they could renegotiate the MOU with the city that covers police in schools; what they can't do is spend that money somewhere else.
The city, on the other hand, could take those funds and instead add them to their allocation for the Worcester Public Schools, where they could be used on things actually of use to students in the school system. That might, however, require the city to notice that they'd be funding the schools at a slightly higher margin above the required minimum than they currently are, something, as Scott O'Connell noted during last week's meeting, only four Worcester School Committee members were willing to request.
And Clive McFarlane nails it.

Worcester City Council hears the Worcester Public Schools budget

Looks like we have John Monfredo from the School Committee, Mr. Allen, and, on her first day in her new position, Superintendent Binienda
updating as we go..once we start...here we go! Mayor Petty is in.
Petty: any questions?

Worcester city budget (with a sidebar on safety)

Mayor Petty just announced that the City Council will meet at 4 pm next Tuesday to begin their budget deliberations. They will meet again at 4 on the 12, the 19, and the 26; they will meet if necessary on June 2.
At some point there will be a schedule of which departments will be heard when; I'll post it once I have it.
___________________________________

Also tonight, the Council took up Councilor Bergman and Rosen's item requesting the City Manager report on the cost of medal detectors and police in schools. They heard significant public testimony tonight (nearly unanimous in opposition), then had a discussion that in part hinged on this being outside of their purview.
In a six-five vote, the motion was defeated, with Mayor Petty, and Councilors Lukes, Rushton, Rivera, Economou, and Palmieri voting against the request for such a report.
Notable quotes:

"why don't we just put bars on the windows and start the concept of a jail early in life?" Lukes #worcpoli

— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) May 6, 2015

"if we were concerned about safety, we would be concerned about what actually works" @Sarai4Worcester #worcpoli

— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) May 6, 2015

Councilors vocally supporting education

A bit late on this post, but in the interest of giving credit where due...

At Tuesday night's Worcester City Council meeting, there was some outspoken support for education in discussing the FY16 budget. An item filed by Councilor Gaffney recommended that the city either not raise taxes at all, or if they were raised, to direct the funding to OPEB, or OPEB, police, and fire; oddly, it appears that Gaffney was partly justifying this based on an assertion that chapter 70 was cut last year and wasn't this year, which is untrue (it was fully funded both years).
The following was said by other councilors in response (and my thanks to Worcester Magazine reporter Tom Quinn, who liveblogged the meeting; all quotes taken from his notes):

Councilor Economou: As a district councilor I think it's premature to make that commitment when the majority of calls I get are about streets, sidewalks, playgrounds, schools.

Councilor Rushton:This is about numbers. Nothing more than numbers. If there is not the 2.5 percent increase, it means 15 million will not be there to fund services. The order is kind of wishy washy – it says don't raise it, but if you do, I want it to go to three categories – police, fire, OPEB. You're eliminating WPS. The 15 mil will be coming out of the classroom.

Mayor Petty;We're not going to do the fire and police motion at the expense of teachers, public works, city hall administrative offices.

Councilor Rosen: The schools are short teachers. I know what it's like to teach in schools without sufficient numbers.

Councilor Rivera: The facts are, when you break this down, we're cutting public works, police, firefighters, teachers.

Now, the proof, as they say, is in the pudding, and so we won't draw any conclusions on this until we see the actual FY16 budget. As has been pointed out a couple of times already this spring, the required contribution of the city to WPS for FY16 went up by $1.6M; usually it goes up by more like $3M. Thus this would be an excellent year for the city to make up ground on underfunding the schools. We remain $3M under minimum school spending; if the city doesn't start to make up ground on that, and doesn't keep up the funding required for transportation, we could be looking at $4.5M or more underfunded for next year.

I'm encouraged by the words. I hope it's more than words.

student safety in Main South

"to address the impediments to the safety and well-being of the students who walk to school, who wait at school bus stops, and who attend school in the Main South area"

Councilor Rivera: prostitution in the area of our students walking to school and around schools
"as a parent, that's a concern for me as our students are walking to school"
increase toward the end of the school year and again towards the end of August
"we really need to deal with this issue"
"there is some work being done at the Council level...does pose a serious safety issue for these students"
"I think sometimes things become a norm within an area, but there's no reason why we should be tolerating this in the vicinity of our students"
Casey Starr, Main South CDC
students need to be able to walk to and from school every day safety
"need an immediate and sustainable solution to this"
Mayor: been an issue in Main South for too long
Boone: schools have been a center of activity, caught in the middle: example where "community comes together"
"staunch supporters of the schools"
O'Connell: meeting on Monday morning on this issue
points brought up this evening were brought up at that meeting
question if there is more we can do: surveillance equipment, to cover in a more blanket way
mention of Department of Homeland Security
Claremont students reluctant to go to Boys Club because activity in area
I should note that our representative here tonight from Claremont is nodding; she lives by the Boys Club and agrees that this is an issue in the area.
Mayor says "many meetings to come on this"
"we are on the right track and this is going to be handled"

Note that our student rep adds that students should know that they can anonymously text a send  "TIPWPD" to the number 27463

Regarding the City Manager's evaluation

There have been several mentions of schools in City Manager O'Brien's annual evaluation by the Worcester City Council.
Among them, Councilor Rivera spoke of the contribution towards net school spending, mentioning it as one of her priorities from last year.
Councilor O'Brien closed with (as "most important") urging a better working relationship with the Worcester Public Schools, commenting that he understood that there was a natural tension, but that schools were the way forward, and that all options should be considered in creating a better working relationship.
Councilor Economou speaks of "meeting those goals on our schools."
Councilor Toomey says that it's "about adequate funding."

Questions on FY14

O'Brien: do we think the Senate will do more for education than the House?
Allen: did not appear that either side will support Governor's proposal; House will likely be final amount
O'Brien: do we know what the city number is? where does that leave us under $800,000?
city increase is about $4 million
city over $500,000 for this (not counting the carry forward) year
city will be about $500,000 above for this year; $800,000 under net
reduces the city gap to $430,000 below Net School Spending for FY14
O'Brien: suggestions from Council on meeting school need; sharing of new growth
historically city and schools split new growth 50/50; that stopped and city kept new growth
might have some discussion about setting aside a small portion of that new growth revenue, maybe 10% to reduce that fiscal deficit
rather than meeting our minimum spending, being a bit above
Economou: goal was to eliminate conversation year-in, year-out
not just meet the goal, go beyond it
set up a plan, a percentage
could even set a cap, "so as not to burden the city side"
maybe anything above the cap could go towards school maintenance
Colorio: something that is measurable
something that is visible to the taxpayers
O'Brien: good idea, meeting capital needs, physical needs
Foley: certainly be talking about some of those issues
how can we parcel those dollars out to have the greatest rigor?
work done in the schools has been tremendous
foundation budget: if we can put this behind us and move forward, that would be great
operating level, reduce previous years
move beyond foundation level
compete with surrounding towns
ELL and special ed going up
Allen: largest increase in budget is probably in special education (partly due to bringing services in-house)
$600,000 losing to charter school assessment in addition to
tuition for FY14 $26.8...entire increase is supposed to be cover in that year
should be at least a million more than what it is in the state budget
Novick: 10% of the new growth (it was 4.9% last year) works out to about $500,000 on $300 million; that's .5%
need to also look at capital spending; an entirely other budget; out of proportion with percentages spent on city/schools operation budgets, relative sizes of employees or those served
Rivera: at what point are we looking at schools that were closed? Can we have a new (reopened) school?
Allen: a process that needs to start now; longer term solution, short term problem
Foley comments that we may need to reopen schools that we closed
Economou: are there other schools that are overcrowded besides Chandler Elementary?
Allen: Union Hill, a lot are getting near capacity
Economou suggests looking at universities and Worcester Academy for space
Economou asks if our state legislators aware of this
Allen comments that the superintendent has been speaking state senators regarding
Allen: vision bringing back magnet schools, replicate successful magnets to balance out enrollments

Transportation

...which is here. And posting as we go...

Transporting nearly 11,000 students daily
Covering approximately 10,000 miles per day
1.8 million miles per school year

WPS School Committee Policy:
“Free transportation is granted to pupils in grades kindergarten through 12 who
reside two (2) miles or more from the school which they are entitled to attend. The
legal obligation of the School Committee in this respect is limited to provision for
transportation for elementary school children and the School Committee does have
the right, if necessary, to charge for transportation or not provide transportation at
the secondary level regardless of where the student may live.”

I'm not going to copy down all of the numbers here of buses or of how much we're spending on them...go check it out!


If we can use the midday service, it's cheaper for it to be done in house (not true of wheelchair service, which is contracted out); if there is not midday service to be used, it's cheaper for it to be contracted out.

We will need another large bus (WEMS adding 6th grade)
and adding 6 special ed buses

Economou asks why we are busing non-public ed students; Allen: various regs requiring us to do that
"The only way to get some transportation savings is to reduce transportation."
"...the only way to get transportation savings is to make very bad decisions"
Economou wants to know how to make those changes; Allen, would need to change the state law to provide those services.
O'Brien: motion to get legal clarification on what our obligations are, and is there any flexibility there?
...if we bus secondary, we have to bus all secondary (private and parochial students, as well as public students)
Rivera: "they don't conribute to the cost at all for transportation?"
Allen: and transportation doesn't count towards net school spending...could reduce transportation costs by $750,000 if we could cut those buses
Rivera comments that she's floored by this
Fuel costs? About $50,000 for price of fuel

O'Brien asks how much is fuel costs and how much is special ed increases?
Rivera asks why it goes up over the course of the year? Sometimes it's students being processed through a team through the year, but sometimes we're getting new students. Boone adds that the special ed process is a 12 month process; part of that is determining whether that requires transportation (as part of an IEP)...looked at like speech therapy, occupational therapy...

Colorio: who do parents call if they have an issue?
Hennessey: three numbers, depending on the type of transportation
508-757-1463 is Durham's dispatch for the big buses
508-755-3495 is Durham dispatch for special ed
508-799-3242 (or 3241) for special ed run by WPS 
Buses can be called directly from dispatch; Durham buses have a GPS system to determine if the bus had been where and when.

Hennessey notes that there is some leeway given to drivers as to if they can safely negotiate particular streets on slippery days.

Colorio asks if parents could pay to get on buses that are within the two miles (ugh)
Allen: fees are approved by School Committee; cautions that it's a very difficult conversation to have as well (due to free and reduced lunch-eligible students)
Boone: 73% students eligible for free and reduced lunch; we have not added fees, "create a system of the haves and the have-nots"
Colorio: there are other private schools that don't "take advantage of transportation"..why do some take advantage and some do not?

O'Brien here is referring this report to City Auditor DelSignore for review (and possible outside review); Novick says she will vote against, if it is a joint referral. Consultation with the clerk says that this is a Education subcommittee referral, so the F&O committee is not voting on this. Referral to Auditor by City Council.

Councilors on the WPS budget

O'Brien: where we've come to where we need to go
"closed eight schools, laid off teachers"
federal stimulus aid, continued support from the state
"equally been a challenging time for the city side"
"beginning to stabilize, due to good decisions being made"; cites council, committee, city manager, superintendent, municipal unions
"where do we invest going forward"
"three critical areas...strong economy...public safety...and you need to have great schools"
"we voted with our feet" (well, some of them...) and sent their kids to Worcester Public Schools