Board of Ed for October: State Student Advisory Council

 The backup provided is here, though it doesn't tell us anything

Sara Khan speaking to this from slides that are hard to see
SSAC Summer Leadership retreat
analyzed a lot of data, data gathering and analyzing

Student protests in France

 Not sure about you, but I often feel that there is so much that is an ongoing catastrophe here in the U.S. that what's happening elsewhere---even within education--can be overwhelmed by just our stuff. So I hadn't caught that students in France have been protesting in what began in Paris but has now swept across the country. The reason?

Demonstrators have voiced a range of grievances, often centering on a lack of resources and opportunities for students in disadvantaged schools, despite the promise of France's national motto: "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity."

Students have drawn attention to rundown classrooms that lack basics such as desks and chairs, become sweltering in summer without air conditioning and, in some cases, are infested with rats. Other common complaints include staff shortages and exhausting workloads. French high school students' compulsory classroom hours are among the highest in Europe.

Significant numbers of schools have been closed this week; it's estimated that a quarter of a million people were protesting in Paris. 

The way that the protests are being met by the national leadership is increasing support for students:

 Nearly 500 people were detained Tuesday, the ministry said. The widespread use of arrests, tear gas and riot-control weapons against teenagers is fueling defiance and angering some parents and teachers. Some student groups called for new protests Thursday....in the latest case, a 15-year-old boy lost a hand Monday in an incident involving a police stun grenade. 

There is video circulating online of  Saint-Denis Mayor Bally Bagayoko shielding student protestors from riot police, as well as being treated for having been tear-gassed.

Things I am reading this week

•  Not specific to education, but this lengthy piece on "AI mania" in the workplace is a very "the Emperor has no clothes" description, where no one can say the Emperor has no clothes because no one else in business leadership will.
  

  The reality is thus: the people in charge either have no plan, or see no path forwards other than keeping their heads down. Not at banks, not at hospitals, not in our government institutions. The world’s organisations have been captured by people in the throes of frothing excitement, and saner people who now live in a state of constant commingled fear and frustration.

  I again reiterate: for education to put any eggs in this basket is badly thought-out.
  
  
• My main takeaway from Chad Aldeman's look at K-12 education spending hitting a trillion dollars is what a huge difference single payer health care would make: 
  

   In 2023-24, schools spent $197 billion on employee benefits. As another way to look at it, for every $1,000 that a school spent on salaries, it also paid $438 in benefit costs. These trends may help explain why districts with rising personnel costs are not boosting take-home pay for their workers. 

  Imagine if we had all that money to spend on any aspect of education, because employees all already had health care. 
  
  
• It's worth reading Matt Barnum's interview with Ary Amerikaner, who co-founded Brown's Promise (and I say that not only because it echoes some of what I question about the lawsuit). 
  
  
• Not sure if it's because the seniors involved have graduated or just coincidences of timing, but there are good pieces covering two separate episodes of attempted throttling of student reporting that came out this week. Wired covers Redwood High in California, where a student journalist turned up a connection to the Epstein files to his local community. In that case, the decision making was in the hands of the students, though this quote from their advisor deserves mention: 
  

  “With all due respect,” Schneider remembers Bishop replying, “under California’s student press law, being afraid of a lawsuit or backlash is not a valid reason to call for the takedown of content.”

  Colorado Newsline covers Grand Junction High, where the advisor was reassigned apparently due to a single complaint by another staff member over a student editorial on the Gaza conflict most recently; the student paper itself published a piece about student press freedom being under threat from their administration in June. 
  
  
• One would really like to think something like the national civics competition would be outside of meddling from this federal administration. It appears that is not the case.

It is July and so my daisies are in bloom.

June 2026 Board of Ed: State Student Advisory Council

 State Student Advisory Council 
for some reason, they never link to the presentation from the SSAC on these...I wish they would

used extensive amounts of data in their work
host successful regional and statewide stakeholder engagement events

June 2026 Board of Ed: opening comments

 As I noted earlier this week, this agenda has the end-of-year group of reports today: one on civics, because 250th anniversary of the Declaration; the end of year Student Advisory Report; probably some talk about the statewide graduation report, which had its own meeting last night; the Mitchell Chester award; plus they have regulations to update.

There's a pre-meeting rally happening in the courtyard outside about immigration, 'though there has not been a lot directed to the Board on that (and the Governor issued guidance on this topic last month)

The livestreaming video is here.

from my walk to the meeting

SCOTUS reject second student free speech case in two weeks

 As we're winding down this session of the Supreme Court, there have been two decisions recently that centered on student speech in schools, and in both cases, the Supreme Court declined, backing up earlier decisions that have sided with school districts. 

The first centered on a 3rd grader wearing a baseball cap with a AK-47 and the words "come and take it" on it. The Appeals Court found: 

...school officials made a reasonable forecast of substantial disruption to the school’s educational environment

...in part due to both the age of the students involved and that it was not far from Oxford High School in Michigan. 

The case most recently decided centered on the perception of the school expressing a view: 

A freshman identified as E.D. sought to hang flyers for a local chapter of the national organization Students for Life of America at Noblesville High School in the fall of 2021. But a dispute over a political photo included in the advertisement led the clubs to be shut down.

The lower courts sided with Noblesville, using a four-decade-old precedent on student speech known as Hazelwood School Dist. v. Kuhlmeier. The 1988 ruling concerned the regulation of school-sponsoned publications, allowing administrators some control over content that might be perceived as the opinion of the school.

While the student could use the school bulletin board to advertise for the club, the school objecting to the political statements used as the illustration was backed by the courts.

Tech backlash is big

For the past two weeks, nearly every day brings at least one, if not more, article about the tech backlash in schools. An attempt at a roundup: 

• If you did not see the graduates of the University of Central Florida's College of Communications and Arts boo their graduation speaker's lauding of AI as the future, please watch (that link is for when it happens, but stay to watch their faces).
  If by chance you're going to be in front of graduates this spring, learn from her (negative) example).
  
  
• NBC News shared an extensive piece on the backlash specifically about iReady, the math and reading assessment program that's now being sued for stealing student data. The reach is huge: 
  

  Nearly one-third of students from kindergarten to 12th grade nationwide use i-Ready, including in nine of the 10 largest school districts.

  And the impact on student learning is not nearly as clear as one might like. I really recommend reading, especially if you're in a district that uses it.
  

• A New York City specific parallel to the excellent piece I linked to last month by Jessica Winter in the New Yorker, New York Intelligencer's "Help! My Kindergarten Is All In on AI. “Are they taking over? Yeah, they’re taking over.”" which speaks not only to the depersonalization of apps teaching kids to read and practice math, but notes the "vast amount of data" that STMath*, for example, is collecting from every child. Never forget what it is actually about for the companies: 
  

   “These companies are literally mandated by their corporate charters to maximize profits in any way possible,” said Bridget Kessler, a mom of elementary-school-age children in Flatlands who also serves on her local community-education council. “So how can I trust that they have the best interests of my kids in mind?”

  Earlier in the piece, by the way, is something I have found particularly insidious: the use of so-called "fellowships" to infiltrate school administrations: 
  

  Three years ago, Google partnered with the AI-focused investment firm Global Silicon Valley Ventures to “advance technology” in education — through programs like Amira, which GSV Ventures has a stake in. Top education administrators have joined the Google GSV Education Innovation Fellowship, including superintendent of Manhattan high schools Gary Beidleman and chief academic officer Miatheresa Pate, who is responsible for the city’s AI guidelines. In a policy document from the fellowship, Beidleman advises educators on how to get parents and teachers to accept AI: Find “early adopters and key messengers” to convert skeptics and achieve a “cultural shift” from within. 

  Such programs are not approved by school committees, despite being a commitment of time, and often no one checks if they align with the goals, policies, and values of the district.
  
  
• Government Technology reports that three-quarters of those surveyed by PA Unplugged think students are spending too much time on screens in schools. The article looks at some specific responses in Pennsylvania. 

• Speaking of making money off of all of this, 404 Media reported that the OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft are all supporting the federal Literacy in Future Technologies Artificial Intelligence, or LIFT AI Act. They aren't doing that out of the best interest of students.

• In terms specifically on AI, I thought this piece in Vanity Fair in which AI is appearing in TV shows and it is always a bad guy was really telling:
  

  The Hacks team also explores the real-life messaging that the tech community has been using—that “AI is coming whether you like it or not,” a catchphrase that is heard around Hollywood on a near-daily basis. Ava (Hannah Einbinder) pushes back on that idea, criticizing this “forced inevitability.” “People like you are always saying that it’s happening whether you like it or not, but you are the ones making it happen,” she says. “You could easily stop it if people could say that they don’t want it—but you don’t give people a choice.”

  Statsky says that aggressiveness from the tech community about AI’s inevitability is a red flag for her as a writer. “Sometimes, when something is being forced so hard, you can smell behind it that it’s not organic and it’s not natural,” she says. “If this was really the dream technology that they were pushing, well, then why are you needing to force it down our throats?”

• The family of one of the victims of last year's shooting at Florida State University is suing OpenAI, which the shooter used in planning the attack. 

“OpenAI knew this would happen. It’s happened before and it was only a matter of time before it happened again,” Joshi said in a Monday statement. “But they chose to put their profits over our safety and it killed my husband. They need to be responsible before another family has to go through this.” 

Attorneys for Joshi also reiterated that “ChatGPT inflamed and encouraged Ikner’s delusions; endorsed his view that he was a sane and rational individual; helped convince him that violent acts can be required to bring about change,” adding that the software provided what he viewed as encouragement to “carry out a massacre, down to the detail of what time would be best to encounter the most traffic on campus.”

• And don't miss John Oliver:
  

April 2026 Board of Ed: Safe Schools for LGBTQ+ students

 There is a document here; you can find their things here

it feels not great that this got bumped to the end

Rachelle Engler Bennett, Associate Commissioner of Student and Family Commissioner
joint effort of Department and MA Commission of LGBTQ Youth
part of DESE's Student and Family Support office
advance educational vision for all students

March Board of Ed: midyear report from State Student Advisory Council

 This is from Isabella Chamberlain, Hudson High School, who is the SSAC chair
focusing this year on student wellness, especially emotional wellbeing; bullying and harassment; and nutrition and school nutritional environment

using state data in working through this

Chamberlain: there is a concern that recommendations are made to the Board and nothing is really done with that
midyear is so that it is while there is work being done on it
hope is that this allows a feedback loop on their work
Fisher: more than half of Black or Asian students being treated badly, you're not going to be engaged
Department's push for culturally sustaining curriculum, make sure we actually live that mission
Rocha: how can we engage just beyond the presentation
Fisher suggests members going to regional meetings
Chamberlain: want to ensure students are creating the focus
give the students the data and say the focus area has to come from that; up to them to do it
connection between Board and students but keep freedom there

National School Walkout Friday, September 5

 Students Demand Action is calling a national school walkout over gun violence in schools for Friday, September 5 at noon local time. This is specifically in response to the Annunciation school shooting in Minneapolis.

There is a prep call for student planners tomorrow (see the second link).

And for any administrators or teachers considering how to respond, I will remind you for the words for then Acting Commissioner Jeff Wulfson regarding this in 2018: 

We have spoken of civic involvement:
"this is it: this is as real as it gets. If this is not a teachable moment, I don't know what is."

June 2025 Board of Elementary and Secondary Education: State Student Advisory Council

 Craven plans to skip the budget update

Student member Ioannis Asikis reporting out on work of SSAC

in person meetings held in Leicester, Worcester, Everett, and Methuen this year
hybrid model maintained to promote accessibility
expanded reach, made meetings more frequent

grounded work in Youth Risk Behavior Survey, representing thousands, weighed to be representative 
thus not only in students on SSAC only

community dialogue with other organizations and agencies
regions reported out on themes within the survey and made recommendations
overarching themes across the state on mental health and connectness to school
mental health must be as prioritized as physical health
embedded across student experiences
across the state there was seen needs for: 

• better access to support
• improved staff training
• stronger relationships between students and schools

mental health access
connectedness/attendance
stigma reduction on seeking help

on Q on how this gets back to local districts, we get a spin around referral back to regional SSAC groups but "how does it get reported out to school committees" comes up empty because there isn't one
THIS IS A THING THAT COULD AND SHOULD BE CHANGED.
Frankly, there also isn't a throughline on what happens even to these reports once they're given!

on Q on how to get information to students, Asikis notes Secretary Tutwiler's Instagram (acknowledgement in the back of who actually runs that), mentioning also newsletter or email 

Asikis speaks of his own experience as an immigrant student growing into being part of student voice 

Board of Ed for March: State Student Advisory mid-year report

This being done by Ioannis Asikis, student member
how are student concerns identified and addressed through SSAC?
SSAC make decisions about education policy and student rights
chair serves as student member to the Board of Ed
DESE charged SSAC to align goals with Department's vision and strategic objections

Top six "wait, WHAT?" moments at Tuesday's Board of Ed

 The things that had me ranting on the way home, in chronological order:

1. Member Mary Ann Stewart AGAIN this month asking questions of a public commenter about an item not on the agenda, in this case on something on which a formal complaint has been filed against the Department, and persisting in doing so despite Chair Katherine Craven telling her not to.
   
   
2. Craven not ruling her out of order for doing so.
   
   
3. Our all learning together that MGL Ch. 15, sec. 1E does not specify "public secondary" schools for the Statewide Student Advisory Council, and so the voting student member of the Board of Ed next year is a student at a private school which is not subject to the Board's oversight.
   
   
4. Vice Chair Matt Hills asking if "from a policy perspective...not a moral perspective" if it didn't make more sense to concentrate the newcomer homeless students in districts that already serve such students, rather than districts that historically have not.
   h/t again to Chief Schools Officer Komal Bhasin for responding "with respect, our policies are influenced by our values" and to Acting Commissioner Russell Johnston for repeating and expanding on the sentiment when Hills persisted.
   
   
5. Member Marty West asking, yet again, if there isn't some way that the Board could direct districts in how they're spending their ESSER funding (yes, the funding that was directed by School Committee vote YEARS ago at this point).
   h/t to CFO Bill Bell patiently, again, explaining that the funding already had been directed and DESE had approved those plans.
   
   
6. Chair Craven responding that, if the Board couldn't do that, perhaps they could direct 3% of each district's Title I funding, as allowed under federal law?
   h/t to Acting Commissioner Johnston for observing that any such plan would have to be discussed with stakeholders, including superintendents who would now have only 97% of their expected Title I funding to direct.
   

Yesterday was haywire. Expect a coming post reviewing when everyone's terms are up!

June Board of Ed: Statewide Student Advisory end of year report

The Statewide Student Advisory Council reports out each year in June and this is that report, given by Ela Gardiner, departing student rep
Note that the SSAC is described at the end of MGL Ch. 15, sec. 1E which is the section that describes the Board itself; every secondary school is supposed to elected TWO representatives to their regional council

this year worked on financial literacy; MCAS graduation requirement; recycling and composting in schools; Narcan and CPR instruction

The Board of Ed meets more than once this week

And if you thought their special Monday meeting to receive a report might be on the Racial Imbalance Advisory Council's report, which came out last week, you'd be wrong! No, Tom Kane has another report out on "education recovery"--he has a scorecard!--so they're having a special meeting. 
Gosh, it's going to be amazing when pet projects of individual Board members don't set agenda items. Also, it would be really smart if we had people OTHER THAN ECONOMISTS talking about the impact of the pandemic on kids.

Anyway, that's at 5 PM today, only online.

Tomorrow, the Board has their usual monthly meeting in Everett with a livestream at 9 AM. On the agenda (most without backups at this time): 

• an update on the Commissioner's search
• the end of year report from the State Student Advisory Council
• an update on DESE's educational vision (there's a link on newly arrived homeless students)
• an FY25 update

You're on your own for tonight, but I'll be liveblogging tomorrow. 

EDIT: I missed one: The Board of Elementary and Secondary Education meets jointly with the Board of Higher Education on Thursday at 3, in an entirely virtual meeting. That agenda includes a presentation on research of K-12 and higher ed, as well as discussions of early college and the FAFSA. 

Board of Ed meets Tuesday

It's at Wellesley High School this month, as that's the school of Ela Gardiner, who is the student member. 

And look at that: the agenda actually has topics the Secretary and Acting Commissioner are expected to address during the meeting! That's best practice...if only they could get the chair to do that, too...

Also on the agenda: the Commissioner's search; an update on safe schools for LGBTQ students; an update on the Department's vision; and a budget update.
No links as yet to backups

Liveblog will be coming your way.

Some things to read today

•  I was struck by this piece in The Nation on student voices being ignored. It's short, but it's food for thought. 
  
  
• In a similar vein, Governing has this piece on public officials listening to their communities.
  
  
• The dangerous anti-vaccine movement that we saw grow so much during the height of the pandemic is growing in influence in statehouses.
  
  
• Every time I see another "parents outraged" on Satan after school clubs and schools panicking, I want to rant about people NEEDING TO GOOGLE, but this piece in The New Republic spells out where this is coming from, and why you should blame Clarence Thomas.

June Board of Ed: State Student Advisory Council

 report of the State Student Advisory Council so this one is over to Eric Plankey
And I don't have this report, so I have no links as yet
state council of 50 members, then 5 regional councils which produce reports for the larger council
changes in student advocacy this year, too
first year of meeting back in person: moved the meetings from Malden to Worcester to increase access

student reps: opportunities for youth involvement in every district
should have two students from every high school in Massachusetts
how do student voices get represented across the state
student government; affinity groups; advocacy groups
handbook for student government, focused on policy change

financial literacy: bundle of resources for districts
life after graduation, paying for college
documented past work to build off of
lesson plans series
presentations from guidance departments on paying for college

health and wellness: youth risk behavior survey
consistent feeling of sadness/hopelessness: 50.1% of girls; 26.6% of boys
only 20.4% of students getting more than 8 hours of sleep
40-50% of LGBTQ+ students had seriously considered suicide
bullying down; alcohol use down
peer on peer support groups
up to date occupational advisors
make sure students aren't overloaded with work; stay balanced

now reviewing regional work: 
Greater Boston: list of recommendations for updating health curriculum; building codes and sustainability
Northeast: guidance on religious holidays
Central Mass: wellness week
Southeast: brochure for school spirit; initiatives on BIPOC history
Western: outreach for representation

Stewart: where can see report? need space on website

"got students thinking about what was happening in their districts"

Mass Association of Student Representatives:
student reps to school committees: every district required to have student rep, have student advisory to school committee
"there isn't a lot of compliance with it"
help spread best practices of students getting involved in their local districts
proposed amendment for student reps voting rights

Student Union of Massachusetts:
coalition of local youth groups from across the state 
local reform efforts to improve student voice
facilitate student gov reform
create template policies for local implementation

three levels of decision making now has a dedicated student advocacy to that level
"creating something special in MA"

Lombos: sees parallels between student organizing and work organizing
excited to see if can bake in continuity

Plankey plans to connect incoming student rep with Board and Department members
"state should be prepared to engage with students as partners"
suggests DESE solidify of SSAC as a partner with the Department: "one stop spot as student voice" for Department

Ella Gardner, Wellesley High School will be incoming rep for next year

Board of Ed: state student advisory council report

Carris Livingstone runs through the regional councils and what each was working on in their workgroups
health and wellness workgroup:
educate students about mental and physical health resources
created a brochure including resources available to students
curricular reforms:
financial literacy student survey, research on need
history framework: need for Native American representation and Asian American history and supplemental information
college and career readiness program
much preliminary data gathering; follow up needed particularly in the curricular areas
DEI: want to diversify the Council
"have a lot of the same type of students that tend to come to our meetings"
emphasize that need diversifying the Student Advisory Council to ensure being welcoming to all types of students

regional highlights:
digital divide work: survey and a district brochure
financial literacy: focusing on online platforms
I think I missed one in here
curricular reform to increase representation
student government reform: resources including platforms to bolster leadership
mental health and wellness: social media page that outlined facts and disparities
college and career readiness: resources for receiving important information
"often there are resources; it's about students being aware"
climate change: how students can clean up their community
student representation: infographic to gain leadership skills and resources on how to make students grow
western group worked on shared resources: AP access

ongoing work on communication

Lombos asks for other feedback
Carris Livingstone speaks of greater communication between the advisory council and the Board
in a continual process throughout the year, not simply a report at the end

Notes from the first meeting of the Worcester School Committee

 This blog started, of course, as a blog of the Worcester School Committee, 'though it started back when it wasn't possible for most of us to liveblog anything, back when I would lug a (heavy!) laptop to the public gallery at Worcester City Hall, write things up, and post only when I got home. I did liveblog some of the meetings I was in; I have done less of that during this past term, partly because juggling the multiple screens during a meeting is a bit much. I do continue to use this blog as my record of what's been going on, however, so I intend to continue to write up as I can what I can.

You can find Thursday's agenda for the first meeting of the new term here.

We were a bit late coming out of executive session--a quick look at the final page of the agenda, which spells out why we were in exec will tell you why--as we're both in successor negotiations and in COVID era negotiations at the same time.

We did have comment from EAW President Roger Nugent, on a few more requests for shared sick bank days. We also had an IA comment on their still-outstanding retro pay; the IA unit was the final one to settle, and thus the lengthy process of updating their pay is still in train. As Mayor Petty noted at the meeting, this is in part due to the city's ancient financial processing system; it was due to staffing issues in payroll (including having a lengthy time before a new manager of payroll was hired by the superintendent after our long-serving one retired in the spring). 

The first report--and I'd say the highlight of the meeting--was a report from our student reps on student sentiment, as gathered through a student survey. I'm going to insert copies of their issues slides below as images: 

The top five issues are mental health (more than half cited it), COVID, nutrition, facilities, and student activities. They also added transportation, as that's already being discussed. 

Each of the slides makes requests and then adds student quotes to the issue.
For mental health, the requests are safe space accessibility; promote resources; mental health awareness/training; expand wellness programming.

For COVID, the requests are social distancing procedures; supplying high quality masks; make-up work guidelines; more hand sanitizing areas.

For transportation, the requests are expand bus routes to students within the two mile radius.
For facilities, the requests are not locking bathrooms, making single use bathrooms accessible, examining HVAC in schools.

For student activities, the request is to enhance them.

The report was sent, by section to subcommittees: COVID and facilities and transportation went to F&O, mental health to TLSS, (and I think bathrooms may have gone to Governance for policy work? I'll have to check). 

The T&G featured this discussion in their coverage of the meeting. One of the things that was mentioned several times by students in their presentation was that in some cases, we have resources or answers to things, but students don't know of them. And if students don't know, it is as if we don't have them. UPDATE: And speaking of that, it comes up in today's Boston Globe article that spent a day with Stacia Zoghbi!

I won't recapitulate my arguments here, but I do think bathroom access is a basic human rights issue, and it makes me furious that we have to even have this discussion. 
I do want to say how fantastically grounding it was for the students to be directing the discussion, and on areas that are under School Committee purview. I'm so grateful that they're putting the time and work into this for the district.

Our second report of the evening was an update on the Barr Foundation-funded Portrait of a Graduate work. This report, which starts on page 44 of the agenda, went through again what this is, with a bit of an update at the end as to next steps. They'll be back in March with a draft.

Both F&O and the superintendent's search reported out: F&O on the ESSER hearing and the search on the public input sessions with the search consultant. Let me recommend the presentation that F&O received back in December on ESSER plans. 

Ms. McCullough had filed several athletic items which came back. Athletic eligibility was recommended to not be changed at this time. Coaches salaries will go to negotiations. She'd also asked about athletic spending; the backup we received was a record of spending. I believe the intent is to take this up with budget.

We voted to settle our bottom line for the FY22 fiscal year, which, yes, is the year that we're about half through. This is $2.25M higher than the budget we voted in June. You can find the full backup starting on page 103. The reason for the change is pretty straightforward: the city budget, and thus the district budget, was based on the Governor's budget. The Governor's budget has often been not what happens for schools, and that was true for this fiscal year again; the Legislature agreed to implement 1/6 of the Student Opportunity Act, while the Governor had budgeted for only 1/7. That's a $2.25M difference for us, and thus the update (which we knew in June would be coming; we just have to wait for the city to set the tax rates first). 

(I asked offline, by the way, if we should make a fuss over this, and it sort of doesn't really matter; by the time we pass our budget, there's usually a good indication of what the Legislature is going to agree on, so even if the line we pass isn't actually it, we know and can plan for what it is going to be.) 

We then had a number of items filed by members for further or future action:

• Mrs. Clancey filed two items to do with safety and building access, stemming from the Doherty High incident last month. She's requesting a report back on safety and security around entering and exiting the schools, and an update on the role of security guards, including their hours.
• Ms. Mailman asked--and the committee agreed--to have members address one another as "Member" which was amended to "School Committee Member" in meetings. 
  Our name plates are going to simply have our full names.
• Ms. McCullough requested that we consider participating in the Practice Safe Skin Program through UMass, which is a sunscreen program.
• Ms. Kamara asked that we set up COVID testing programs in each of the four quadrants. This is a great idea that we don't have the resources to do, which was the response of administration. As I also had filed an item asking for a COVID update as a standing item at each meeting, we took that up more generally. She asked for the protocols around COVID positive employees.
  The superintendent gave us the update on COVID positive cases: between 1/14 and 1/20, there were 936 positive students, 36 quarantined students, and 922 test and stay students; and 142 positive employees, 1 quarantining, and 43 test and stay. 
  Superintendent Binienda also confirmed that the district will not be switching to the new voluntary home testing protocol the state has put together. 
  I asked that the reminder about masking requirements go to school staff as well as students, as I've received a number of student complaints that staff aren't properly masking (and the balance of power is such that students aren't in the same position on reminders). I also asked if we could get a report back from Honeywell, which is currently doing an analysis of our HVAC systems, if the portable ionization/filtration units that had been in the old South High school could or should be moved to the cafeterias of the schools that don't currently have those, as many of us are concerned about lunch being the most dangerous time of the day for transmission of COVID.
• Ms. Kamara asked that the position of chair and vice chair of subcommittees be clarified; this was going to Governance, so it will be taken up with the rules at their next meeting, as will my requested addendum that we also define the subcommittee's realms.
• I sent policy DK to Finance and Operations so we can align it with the city charter (If you have ever heard me talk about why some city school committee members don't have to learn about warrants, you'll know why. I can do a post on it later.)
• I sent an item on considering new and reoccurring building needs to the joint committee we have with the City Council (and have I mentioned how thrilled I am that Councilor Nguyen is chairing the Education subcommittee?)
• Two to discuss that a number of other districts have been moving forward on: eliminating the "test out" option for the employee vaccination requirement, and adding a requirement that students participating in extracurricular activities be vaccinated. (That last was proposed by WPS student athletes who are concerned about their friends and teammates.)
• I proposed a pilot of supplying menstrual supplies at secondary schools. The superintendent said that we do; as students don't know that we do--heck, I didn't know that we do!--it seems we have work to do, particularly around equity of access and not having to make special trips places and ask for them. It's going to Finance and Operations (budgetary impact).
• Something we're overdue for on our calendar: to consider what observances are recognized by the Worcester Public Schools. That went to Governance. 
• Another that came from students: To make provision within all WPS secondary schools of space for prayer during the day for those whose religious observance requires it; relatedly; to add to the student handbook notification to students and families that such provision will be made as needed. This is going to Governance for the policy aspect and to F&O for the physical plant question. 

We also voted to accept an FCC purchase of  $7,375,056 for the purchase of 23,192 Chromebooks, which, hey, is good news!

I want to do a separate post on two upcoming School Committee meetings, but let's let this one stand as it is!