School Committee Meeting - August 31, 2026

I think we're recording to our colleagues. If we can sit or get to our spaces, you don't have to sit. Don't want to tell you what to do. Good evening and welcome to this August 31st, 2026 meeting of the Somerville School Committee. Pursuant to Chapter 20 of the Acts of 2026, this meeting of the school committee will be conducted via hybrid participation. We'll post an audio recording, video recording, transcript or other comprehensive record of these proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting On the City of Somerville website and local cable access government channels, I do also want to note that my understanding is that on Zoom there is no audio. I think that has been made clear online, but for those who need it you can access the city cable in order to watch the meeting.

With that, superintendent are you willing to call the roll?

Through the chair. Council Davis? Here. School Committee Rep. Piton? Rep. Lippens?

Here.

Rep. Eldridge?

Present.

Representative Green?

Here

Dr. Stellman, Mayor Wilson, Vice Chair Biton and School Committee Chair Dr. Ackman With seven present, we have quorum.

Okay. We have a moment of silence and salute to the flag. To the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation indivisible with liberty and justice. All right, we have called to order. With the committee's consent, I am going to... We noted that there is no public comment today. I'm going to move to item

Under new business, community or calendar updates from committee members because I believe that discussion qualifies as a community update. At the end of last school year, it was brought to my attention that For those presenting at public comment that there is no option for should the individuals start speaking in ways There's no way presently for me to prevent that from going on the record as the chair who oversees it I've reached out to the city about this. What we were offered was a buzzer and

Sorry, let me walk that back. We consulted with legal counsel and legal counsel is concerned that it leaves us as a body exposed legally if there's not a way to Shut that mic off from up here for someone who is speaking in a way that could be unlawful or that could leave us exposed to a lawsuit. You know, we have reached out to the city. Our new chief of staff, what's her title? Our new chief of strategy and operations has done a great job working on that. And so what we were told is that we can have an alternate mic set up, but the city is asking the district to foot the bill for that alternate setup.

I think it is important to bring this to the body because it would mean a reallocation of funds to do that. Public comment is very important. Someone who reached out yesterday, I'm going to attempt to quote said it is a foundational aspect of our democracy. I couldn't agree more. I didn't make this choice lightly, but leaving us exposed legally is not a responsible choice. So, you know this note it comes you know it is a something in the community oh sorry uh Rep Green

Yes, you mentioned that there would be a cost and asking us to pay it. How much will that be? What are we looking at for that cost?

It was $2,000. So because this wasn't brought to you in advance, I don't want the committee to feel like we have to have this conversation off-the-cuff. But I do think it's an important one to have publicly and decide if you know want to be reallocating those dollars or if there are other ways we want to see if we can, you know implore the city to make the investment on our on their behalf in order to keep public comment going. Rep. Pitone?

Thank you through your chair, Ackman. First of all thank you for following up this and paying attention to this it's a lot of level of detail in terms of the fact that the mic didn't have the control to turn on or off and we may or may not have even noticed that because Not surprisingly, I know as what I've observed for you as the chairs, you don't want to turn off the mic. There's no interest in trying to repress public comment but in places where people and include topics that are not relevant to us or when they talk about staff which is not Part of our policy says we should not be doing that. It came up and you noticed it wasn't working. I think I'm a bit confused, obviously it's not a huge amount of money but any money that we take from The school's budget comes from something that is already allocated for students. This is a functioning part of a city facility and so

I'm just a little confused at why the city would be asking schools to try to pay for something That has to do with how the city functions. And just because we have an operational need that's a little bit different than the city's need, I'm just—I'm a little surprised. So I don't know, has this city provided like something in writing to say why they won't Pay the money to just, because I would think this is just a maintenance because it was a function that was always there. So if it is maintenance for a city building that the city would pay for it and that's why I'm a little confused. Second, I really appreciate you pursuing this.

Thank you, if it's okay with you Dr. Stellman I'll respond so what i will say is we haven't gotten a reason in writing we just have gotten sort of the expectations that they have laid out I was hoping Mayor Wilson would be here to, you know, be able to speak on behalf of the city about it. Hopefully he will. But yeah, sorry to answer that question. Do you want to respond or should I get in queue? Go ahead.

I was just going to point out, I know that Mayor Wilson is on his way. He's at a couple events this evening and just not to jump the queue but as the president of city council who ultimately controls the chamber I'm happy to, probably not during this forum but you know happy to have a conversation with you with the mayor see what we can sort out. I first learned of this just this afternoon when i saw your email so um I don't have all the details. I also share the frustration of that mic not being able to be turned off for a little bit different reasons, but happy to take this offline and work together and see if there's something we can figure out.

I really appreciate it. Dr. Stellman? I think that covered it. I just wanted to, I was just curious why how this would impact the city council as well as have public comment also but if President Davis and the Mayor are going to get together. Let's get it back up and running.

Wonderful. Make sure no one else wants to say anything before we go to Rep Green. Okay, go ahead.

I just wanted to build on Rep. Pitone's point, just for the public. Discussing staff by name in public comment is not only against our policy it's against our cost of bargaining agreement They have a right to face their accusers and be here for that, so we would be in violation of our labor agreements as well if we Couldn't stop those comments from being made, so I just want the public to understand that there actually is a legal component to which we are obligated to make sure that people aren't committing to public record and potentially slandering our staff.

Yes, thank you for helping to clarify Rep Eldridge.

If we could, I realize that some options have been explored. I'm wondering what the timeline might be and how long it might impact public comment. Wondering if it's a possible quick fix or if this is kind of a lengthier I don't know what's involved in it, but if it's a lengthier process to get repaired.

That's a great question. What I can say is I will bring that back my understanding was that Should the investment be made, it would be sort of remote items like any of us could get and should be able to access pretty easily. yeah because I you know the mayor did explain to me that in order to like repair repair it would involve digging up the floor here and that you know Seems like an unreasonable expense for the city, but the workaround options... can get up and running quickly. If I'm incorrect about that, it behooves us to let the public know as quickly as possible.

So I will work in collaboration with President Davis, with the mayor and we will ideally have this taken care of by our next meeting. Okay, because I have gone to community and calendar items from committee members, I'm going to go on the notes that are here. because we usually bring up this item at the end of the meeting. If, at the ends of the meetings there are things that you want to bring up, we can definitely come back to this. I wanted to note that our September 21st regular meeting probably due to sunset would fall at the end of Yom Kippur so we are moving that to September 28th and then There's a joint MASC, Massachusetts Association of School Committees, Massachusetts

School Superintendents Conference, November 4th through 6th. And that's just a note to the members if you haven't let Erica know if you're going I believe We're still under the wire for the early sign-up deadline bonus, so please go. It is in Danvers this year which is great news for those of us who want to sleep on our own beds and I think it's a great conference, and hope that we all go. Member Piton or Rep Piton? Thank you through you.

I just want to encourage members even if they have schedule issues, if they can go for a day, two days. You don't have to go for all three days I am probably planning on staying because there is an opportunity, and I think at least one other member's gonna stay to connect with our members as well as members of other school committees. I've learned so much and I've created some really good relationships that have really improved my ability to do work as a school committee so um so i encourage people if they can Spare the time to take a day, two days, three days. Whatever works for them to be able to participate and because it's in Danvers you can go for a half a day. I don't know how the pricing works out so You can check in with Erica, but I would urge people to try to make the time. It's been very valuable for me. Thank you

Yes, perfectly stated. I also would like to note that I believe the superintendent and assistant superintendent are presenting at this year's conference with a consultant? An SPS parent who has been volunteering their time for the district and submitted a session that got approved. And I will have more info about that as we get closer. Are there any community or calendar items from committee members? I will also come back to this item at the end. Okay. Thank you to everyone for your grace and patience. All right, now we did our call-to-order so we are on to Roman numeral two approval of minutes. Do I have a motion?

for the approval of the June 8th, June 15th 2026 minutes and special meeting of the whole for August 10th, and special meaning of the hole for August 17th.

So moved.

There it is.

Second.

All right I have a motion by member Rep Biton seconded by Rep Green All in favor? Aye. All opposed, any abstentions? Okay thank you um all right we are on to oh I didn't say happy first day I apologize. It's not often that our first meeting is also the first day of school, so it is a special gift for us to Have all the photos flood and to see kids so excited. And yeah, so we're thankful and with that we'll go to the report of the superintendent.

Great, thank you chair and I will do the drum roll for first day of school. Yes everyone welcome welcome welcome And this time around, I'm going to direct you to the screens. I have a report that I decided to add a visual component to that to make it easier for all of us to kind of follow along. Have you made the next slide? This is the agenda for the items that I want to discuss in my report. The readiness piece, as you know we see what happens on the other end but we see very little of all the work that happens behind the scenes We will highlight some of the momentum that we have around instructional focus and some of other work that is happening this year. And also, we will speak to the academic under data focus that we on 26-27.

So as I was saying, readiness is something that happens behind the scenes. So day one didn't happen on day one but it happened two weeks before. Next slide. And so we started our weeks before, two weeks before making sure that our students and our members of the community understood exactly what is the work ahead. As you see in the screen, we have teachers getting ready for the learning that was taking place in professional development as well as The work that happens with all our administrators. But I wanted to make sure that I thank all the educators in our district, because again the work that happens, happens way in advance and it's a combination of ideas that have come up as well as our goals based on our strategic plan. and obviously Convocation.

That was to me the highlight of the entire two weeks, in part because I feel that as a community we always have to come together. To have a community, we have to be in community. And I know it's difficult to come to the high school for an hour and the parking is a challenge But regardless of that, I feel that it's extremely important that we as a community get recharged and also get aligned into what we feel is the most important task for the entire year. So I was really excited to see that the high school led the entire district in a dance. Emma, Dr. Stellman and Laura Piton were also very well coordinated during those days. There's a video floating out there in which my hands are not coordinated so... Yeah, we will not talk about that but I know

Member Biton also had a beautiful speech highlighting how she is committed to the district as well as the fact that her kids have gone through the entire cycle of education in our district. I think the important thing here is that the work that happens to be ready in every of our schools happens because the willingness of our educators and everyone that makes the thinking possible. Day one of course came today and as you all know we had also some important guests in our district. and but the most important thing is that the kids came and every building was full of joy as well as welcoming efforts from every educator so please help me Congratulate our educators and our students on their first day, please. Thank you.

And as you know, we have the Commissioner and the Secretary of Education today. It's really I feel that is an honor to be recognized by You know, understanding that the work that we do in Somerville is unique and also in a space like the Argentiano that is a very diverse community that reflects the values and the makeup of our district. So that's a very exciting start of the day, start of year. I also mentioned that the work that happens behind the scenes is also work that happen in the buildings The DPW and IAM have been doing an amazing work in the smallest space of time that they have. As you know, buildings are used for summer programs For professional development and also for all the work that has to happen in between.

And so, that work happens in a small amount of time knowing that pretty much in every building there is a large project that is taking place. and I wanted to again pass along the heartfelt thank you to our friends in DPW as well as IAM. And I know that we have Dr. Sanon will share with us some of the facilities updates around the entire district in some subsequent slides and The one thing that I think is, I'm really excited to share. Next slide. Is the focus that we have around some of the priorities that we had built already One of the things that we wanted to be clear with every building, every leader in our district was to make sure there were no new initiatives in our districts.

but it was basically going deeper and building on the foundations of all the work that we have done so far. As you can see, built around the systems that we have. We have built around these strategies. The instructional implementation continues to be a heavy lift and that is in some degree somewhat of a snowball. We still have to actually build some repertoires and habits around the new content that we have, that requires that we also learn how We utilize the content to create more access for students when learning needs to be targeted in a certain way. and one of the things that oh I okay well so let me pause there I know that I wanted to also, Meekerly is here and I know she has to be home at a certain time.

So Meekerley before I continue with the next part of the I'm going to have you share some of the work that is happening at the facilities level.

Absolutely, it's a pleasure. First we want to say on behalf of the superintendent's office and the entire Somerville Public Schools, we wanna say thank you to the mayor and DPW and IAM. They have heard a lot from us, and for me even this morning in opening the doors to the schools So we don't want to minimize the amount of work that it takes to get our schools ready. I also wanna say that the report included in the packet was prepared by Eric Wiseman, who spent a lot of time on the report and what he mentions very lightly is that there is a quick and short turnaround between the end of summer programming and the start of the school year. and so we're really proud to say that over the summer, they've not only been able to accomplish some high-level summer projects. There were some upgrades to the Argenziano kitchen I also know that there was some accessibility concerns at Winter Hill that were addressed and I know that they're a couple that remain outstanding that we are working on.

In addition, we're excited to share that the Kennedy Playground phase one is complete. With that said we also want to name that there are a couple of ongoing larger facility projects that are on our radar and we're paying close attention because the commitment is that it does not interrupt school. and so in particular we want to flag that at the West Somerville school there's scaffolding. And we've spent a lot of time thinking about how to make sure it is safe for our students The IAM and DPW have been great at updates in ensuring us that students will not be impaired, they'll be able to play outside regardless. We've done some upgrade with HVAC and we're continuing to follow through on folks' concerns around HVC. In Argenziano, we are continuing to prepare the building to welcome new programming this upcoming year

and there are also the purchasing of two huge boilers that thankfully got into the building without issue and will be installed at some point this school year. I think that's it.

That's it? Excellent, thank you. Thank you very much.

Can I quickly say welcome Dr. Sannin we're really excited you're here and thank you for the update Oh, Rep Green and then we'll go with Rep Green.

So through you, I think actually technically YouTube not really. It's super helpful seeing all and it's super impressive how much work given all the constraints DPW has done over course every summer It's amazing, all the things in the world. What would be helpful for me though is if we could have some way of breaking it down compared to the work that we know is still pending Just so we know where we stand relative, not just in absolute terms like they did a lot of work because yeah they did all the work but what still needs to be done and so if I could you know get a memo just laying that out that'd be super helpful just going forward.

On it, it sounds like a table that's completed in progress. Progress status. Yep.

Thank you. Vice Chair Biton?

Thank you, Chair, through you. Just I happened to be at the West Somerville this morning for a coffee hour and I ran into our Amazing Facilities Coordinator, Danielle Berry. I had the opportunity to walk around with her to see the scaffolding for the roof work It looked incredibly constrained, clean, orderly, safe. I was so impressed with what I saw. No work was happening today because it was the beginning School Operations, and we didn't want roof work to be happening. And it just inspired so much confidence in me the way this was proceeding. So huge thanks to the city, to DPW

and for all the coordination you're doing on the school side that's all yes I'll say to you know sort of yes and uh that they've been in like In anticipation of seeing cranes above the school the weekend before school starts, Director Raish reached out and wanted to be sure that Thank you, Dr. Sonnen. Sorry, Mayor Wilson. I apologize. I Apologize.

No that's fine Chair. If you weren't in this morning's cabinet meeting I think the The story of how the boilers actually got moved into position in Argenziano was wild. These are basically, I think they said two ton? that had to be finessed into these elevators to get them down there and there were some hairy moments where people are wondering like wait we measured this but is it actually gonna fit so yeah the tough part is done they're in the building now and they're ready to be hooked up here that's the much easier part as we understand it but that's good news because we don't want that boiler failing at Regenziano because if that happens there is not a good spot to put a Mobile Boiler there at all and we might have been looking otherwise at having to vacate that building so this is a big step getting the new boilers in there

All right, Dr. Stellman.

Through you, this question may get answered in the academics so let me know if I can wait. In previous several slides ago when Dr. Carmona was talking about The work that's being done to really support teachers with new high quality instructional materials. and I'm wondering what's different? What are some of the different approaches because obviously If you want something to be different, you've got to do some different things. So I'm just curious about that and I can wait until this or if there's comments from Dr. Boston Davis, Dr. Carmona. Thank you.

Yeah, great question. So why don't we go through the instructional part and then the academics part? And then we can probably take questions on that section. So one of the things that we're trying to do also was to identify what is one simple way in which we actually have a rallying call in our district so it's clear to everyone that what we do is reflected in the actual practice. And so one of the things that we share with everyone was our intention to make sure that this comes through, to be realized in every classroom. So every student learns, every class, everyday. So that's our rallying call right now, making sure that everyone understands that in principle is a simple thing. Is that right? I know I talk to our parents and say well of course the students go to school to learn And so that's great. That's a premise that we all assume is true.

For that to happen every single day and every day, and the students do the heavy lift and that teachers actually create the conditions for that to happen is not as simple as it looks. And so there are some questions that we want everyone to ask in terms of when you go into a classroom, the question is what are students learning? and then how do we know that that's happening? And if that's not happening, then what do we do about it? So the question is how are we actually embedding in embodying all these questions and also our Mindset around the day-to-day behaviors that need to happen in every room. So, every student learns in every class everyday is the one thing that every principal relayed to every faculty And again, knowing that when we walk into a classroom what we want to see is the students are engaged and they're doing the talking. They're doing writing. What they call the productive struggle.

So students are doing their work and our work is to make sure that the teachers have the tools to be able to create these conditions So again, if everyone asks you, that's the rallying call for the year. One thing that we are actually doing a little bit differently is they work around data. So we have been working since a couple of years, we started using data to make instructional decisions, and that continues to be happening in every classroom. I know that the work that has happened at the district level has been also around these concepts. What is different though, is that we are building systems that actually Force the hand or force our hand to make sure that at the end of a cycle, a literacy cycle there is

A time in which teachers meet to look at the data and then a times in which administrators support the teachers with that cycle, look at students determine what's happening what's not happening and then how do we improve it. and the idea is to do that multiple times throughout the year. Now, that has been the design but the monitoring if you will or the supporting of that from both the central office to the teachers, every building is something that I believe has been done more intentionally. I was going to actually put a big chart that we created in our offices that shows when every meeting or every and many more. The CPT leaders. So the idea of having this connected effort is something that is different.

I think it was there, it was in paper but as you know we have gotten feedback around the fact that Everyone has the intention of doing their work, but the work needs to be also measured through the actions that we already have throughout the system. The other thing that I wanted to highlight is that we made a significant investment around the work of inclusive practices. Aview actually is not that picture but there's another picture in which we all were working together both all the administrators with the person who was supporting the district she was the person I forgot her name She led the work around the audit or the review around special education. So that's one of the things that actually as a district we're doing more intentional is making sure

Our inclusive practices are also scaffolded in a way that is more practical for everyone. So, thus part of the Next slide. The work around data is one of the things that we have done throughout the year, and also the change if you will has been around making sure We not only look at the data, but we also look at what are some of the systems that we have to build upon that data. And then how do we know what we know? I wanted to highlight As we have shared before, we see an upward trajectory in our data. And of course IREDI is here to tell us that if you look at the red Category is decreasing, the blue is increasing. So that is an upward trend that we see through iRata from 23 to 25 I believe

And if you look at the next slide, we know that information is being confirmed or corroborated by some of the preliminary MCAS data that we have. from MCAS again this is data that has not been it's an embargo mode but that's one of the ways that we actually know when we triangulate the data we know that there are some positive directionality on the work that we're doing. Math was a very bright brightest part in our data and also the access data shows that we have done an improvement that we haven't seen in a couple of years. And yet, next slide We also know that there are significant areas of growth. If you look at this chart, it shows us

Our iReady data shows that we still continue to make upper improvements or an upward movement in terms of math and reading. But if you look at it, we're talking about 25 to 20% of our students who have an IEP are performing at levels that are not acceptable. And so one of the things made an effort is making sure that the work that happens around inclusive practices is consistent across the board. So as a result of that, we have devised five instructional strategies. One of those is the continued focus on professional development and both in the instructional practices that we discuss as well as in the systems that we're building internally.

also the cycles of data that's one thing that again we built up for the entire in the days before our Opening Days is working with every principal and every building leader as to how they're going to embed themselves in the cycles of data that they do in their buildings. and in collaboration with other partners, outside partners we are actually working on making sure that that's also systematically. The work around Xblock is something that we have been doing and you probably have heard us talked about Xblock for multiple times but the idea is that since we actually have been doing this for close to three years there are some buildings that were still developing some muscle around that so they work now is on monitoring and supporting that work in every building And also we're leveraging some partners to make sure that the work that happens again continues to inform our practices both at the central office level and at the school level.

We will be partnering with Ignite and Catapult to make sure that the work that happens in the early grades happens more consistently. And again, with the support of some expertise from outside. So those are the five areas in which we are making sure that we are consistent, that we're predictable and that we also have a strong presence from both the central office as well And that is the end of my presentation.

Thank you. Do we have comments, questions? All right, I will go clockwise. Reputon.

Thank you chair through you to the superintendent. I want to just share my thanks for, in particular the focus area number one. So important. This every student learns, every class, every day and just recognizing that and emphasizing the importance of that priority area. I think every one of our families knows how important it is when they send their children to school, like today, the first day that we've got them, right? We're focused on their child. And I think you couldn't have said it any better so I just This really resonated with me and what I hear, I know our families, our teachers are

so committed to this already and just having the words means so much. So I just wanted to express my gratitude.

Thank you. We'll go Dr. Stellman, then Rep Green, then Representative Eldridge.

Thank you and through the chair. So just piggybacking on Rep Biton, there's a quote that I'll grab from Dr. Carmona just referenced oh day-to-day behaviors but that piece was so resonant for me the idea of Knowing that we're watching, we're really getting to know, we are following behavioral patterns which are critical to learning. and I think that focus on the individual within the context is critical to this work. So, I really liked that concept I wanted to go back to the question around what's different in the ways in which, what are some new things you're trying or what are things that you're doing more or differently?

with the educators as they take on new ways of teaching math or English or all of the academics. So thank you.

So let me try to respond that and it's kind of a realization that I stumble upon as we looked at data and think about what are the habits that we have to build around that. I met with a principal and said, can I take a look at what are some of the data around some of outstanding teachers that we have in our district? and as we looked around the MCAS data, we looked at... And again I'm using MCAS as a reference because it's something that we universally kind of know. And it turns out this particular teacher was like 60-75 50% proficiency on growth. And it's like, wow this is amazing. Is that right? We have excellence. We have an excellence in every building and I is not about reinventing excellence but it's about making sure that we replicate excellence throughout the district. And so, that was one realization that we have all these tremendous assets in our district

And yet, sometimes we see that the performances are uneven. You know, Elmar would say that the greatest challenge for education is that idea You have so much discrepancy from one classroom to the next one or from one to the... And so it's not really recreating any things, but actually having a system that is more reliable, more predictable. We have created some calendars of monitoring for us and to support principles, to build our capacity in looking at data. Holding folks accountable to that data and holding ourselves accountable to the data But we also have some other things. We have also some partnerships, and I don't know if you want to talk about those, Dr. Boston-Davies? But is that in combination with the, you know, the cycles of inquiry that we have had them but we haven't had a rigorous way to really match them and check them?

and ask the question that I asked which is okay if it's not happening why and then how do we know because sometimes you know it's we have our best intention as we attribute some Correlation to things that sometimes are not there and so really knowing exactly how do we know will allow us to also identify the needs that students have in a much more precise way.

Thank you.

Through the chair, I'm happy to build off that. And thank you for the question. And I just greatly appreciate the idea of not necessarily something new and I know your question was what is different but maybe going deeper and perhaps approaching the same body of work in a deeper, maybe slightly different way to help enhance and shift outcomes in a positive way in the trajectory that we already see them going. So to build off of what Dr. Carmona mentioned around partnerships, there are some different things that are happening in terms of our partnerships. And this is partially due to the generous grant we received from the Barr Foundation around strengthening school leadership and one of the kind of core Beliefs of this grant, well it's not even a belief. It's grounded in research was that how important the role of the school principal is

and investing in ensuring that the principal can be the instructional leader in the school. And so we're doing that, through that grant that we received We are investing in a few different ways. First, the supervisors of principals are going to receive coaching and training So that includes Dr. Carmona, that includes myself and that actually includes Dr Beretta who is our CFO but he also, he's gonna supervise a couple of principals also because he has extensive experience in school leadership as a principal in the school district of Philadelphia, and extensive background in schools. So in a way to actually I think I just said two shifts in one which is that One, we're receiving coaching to strengthen our supportive principals. But two in order for our superintendent who has a very big job to do his job well

He is sharing, we're distributing that leadership of supervising principals in that way. So, that was two things. So that's one. Also through the Bar, the generous funds from the Bar Foundation our principals are continuing with what they Very, very clearly said was a huge positive for them which is the coaching from Lynch Leadership Academy and that's through Boston College. And we're gonna deepen that and expand that We are also for our school leaders, we always do instructional rounds. Well, we've been doing that now for about four or five years and so Instead of myself being the facilitator of that, we have an outside facilitator also who was an LLA alum. His name is Robbie Chisholm and he's works for TNTP and he's going to lead us through those instructional rounds so there's some learning happening there. In addition to that, so I said the principal supervisor. We said TNTP.

We say LOA. We also have as you know we do have a new instructional coach model and so that will feel different We have a coach in each school building and in some buildings there are two, meaning a person is shared between two buildings so they have two actual coaches in that building. And so the coaches have come in several times. It's an amazing team, and they are kind of working very hard to support instruction in that way. And then finally, I think what hasn't well emphasized a bit that Dr. Carmona touched on was is the inclusive practices PD? Dr. Jenna Ruffo is the name of the consultant who did the special education and intervention service delivery review which we talked about extensively in the spring

She also came back and led PD with our administrators, which she's doing throughout the year. She's also leading in all of our district-wide professional development. In addition to that, schools are able to also make a school specific inclusive practices PD. So this touches one of her biggest areas of feedback which is that we have The high quality instruction materials in place, but there was not consistent and so on. I think that kind of goes a little bit deeper. There's not really anything new here we're just really trying to enhance and get like kind of sharpen our pencil if you will with the tools that we have

This is not a question, it's just my opinion which is for people who are listening to this and May not be educators or have gotten a chance to see other districts across the country. This is fantastic this is really the level of instructional leadership that I am very proud of as a school committee member and I just can't tell, like if I were... A teacher or administrator going back into a school system, I would come here. So I just want to give kudos and let folks know that this is This isn't the norm, but it should be and hopefully it will be across the nation.

Thank you. I want to note anecdotally this morning when the superintendent was talking to the commissioner of education, Commissioner asked about you know our staffing and our openings, and the superintendent said you know very fortunately aside from a few pieces all pieces are necessary we are almost fully staffed and you know I think that is a credit to Educators are seeing that there's an investment and listening to educators. And so I credit the assistant superintendent, and superintendent, Getting a contract that shows that we care deeply about our educators and invest in them. And we are moving on to Rep Green.

Dr. Boston Davis kind of messed up what I was going to say. I was gonna praise the commitment to doing So not being revolutionary, not being transformative, but being transformative by actually getting the work done. But you are doing something that I think is years overdone. It is a dramatic change. Which is that as long as I've been on school committee, the superintendent had way too many direct reports. and has made our org chart unwieldy and messy. And most importantly, to that point about not having consistent implementation of instructional models It's really hard to do that if people have more supervisees than they can actually supervise. So shifting how we are supervising our building leaders is actually a pretty huge dramatic change which ironically by having more supervisors should make it easier for all the supervisees to be treated the same, get the same level of attention when oftentimes you know

It's easy for things to fall through the cracks if we're asking our superintendent, in addition to running a district, supervise 20-30 people. So I really want to acknowledge that actually is a huge change. That should make it much easier for us implement these Subtle, but the actual changes and their implementation that actually improves student learning.

So kudos on that Thank you perfectly stated I'll go to rep Eldridge then Rep Lippens

Thank you. Through the chair, I just wanted to say how excited I am to be on the ride with y'all for Focus Area 2 in particular about building a stronger culture of data and this beautiful system that you've put together here of how to keep track of our work and where we're going and how we're responding and supporting kids. and I'm excited to hear about the calendar like i'd love to learn more about that and really follow along on this journey because it sounds really exciting and like there's so many opportunities for our students to be really successful So thanks for making that one of the focus areas. I wanted to ask maybe a little bit, also a little nitty gritty question. Under the instructional strategy for school year 27 I'm really excited to see Dibbles mentioned on there. It's an area that i'm really passionate about and I noticed that the mention of K through third grade and I'm wondering if there's any way to, I guess maybe like elaborate more on or consider maybe a K-2

Aboff, were four times or more likely to be dropping out of high school. And so I love the focus on it, but I'm wondering if maybe we could possibly close... Why didn't that... K-3 and maybe consider a K-2 so that we can catch our kiddos before, you know, we're no longer reading to learn but—we're no and how fourth grade really is such a huge time for that transition. So I'd love to hear any feedback on that or just what your thoughts are on the selection of the K-3, or if there's open for further discussion?

Thank you so much for that and totally agreed. I looked at Dr. Carmona briefly because we, over the summer, the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents The Urban Supes Network, I should say under that umbrella had a summer retreat where we looked specifically at first grade. and talked about how important it is in first. So really, the presenter who also leads Ignite Reading which we are partnering with so that's kind of where I'm going for this year partner in a small scope with Ignite, really said we need to focus in. By the time we get to third grade, we need So speaking very similarly in the way that you did. I deeply appreciate that point and agree.

We are going to partner, so we applied and received as you know the early literacy tutoring grant from DESE which is exciting. And similarly the focus of that is also at a younger grade So we are partnering with Ignite Reading for a couple of schools, which is during the day. And we're gonna continue to partner with Springboard, which after school and they both focus on I think The premier focus area is first grade and then if we can't fill the first-grade seats, which we likely will but if we cant then we expand. So I'm sharing these details to say, I think we share a similar and were very inspired Certainly over the summer with a similar, we need to narrow the scope a bit. And so you'll see that in some of the initiatives that are being piloted and I think we can revisit what that looks like as it shows up in our kind of

I don't know if you want to share anything else about that, but I do appreciate it.

We literally came out of that meeting and we made a contact right away because her claim was what they call the first grade promise, which is by the end of first grade every student or 85% of the students Thank you very much. since we don't want to also create so you know not having the infrastructure and the capacity we're going to pilot that into schools but I am really invested in that. I think that I have been a teacher and I always felt like the work that happens in first grade is so amazing. And if we don't get it right in that year, it's very difficult for kids to catch up. And so Ignite promises that the gains that they... End up in first grade. They continue throughout elementary. I am really looking forward to see that we will be piloting that.

I also was very excited to see when I went to visit the schools of the East on Friday, the professional development they have the new Foundations materials. And I could hear from the teachers, the conversation about how they felt that this version that they had was much more targeted for kids. And so I feel that we're moving the needle in multiple places, I totally agree with you it should be that but As we're building the system, we have to really find the resources and also implement some pilots. But fully agree with you on that.

If I may add one thing and this actually is back to Dr. Stellman's question, just the superintendent reminded me in terms of what is different we are still implementing high quality instruction materials so in grades So kind of to this point, in grades K through two. We are implementing foundations this year for our structured literacy curriculum and then we are implementing Witten Wisdom and that's for the more comprehension content side of the reading. So those actually are different to the point, and that is a focus of K through two.

This all sounds fantastic. Do you think it might be possible for us to keep a closer eye as we're going into this year of what our first graders, where they're starting? as you implement this kind of like watching them a little bit through the process so you have the opportunity to fine tune and adjust but I think it's really exciting stuff. And I personally am so invested in learning more about how we see these changes happening amongst our students. So it'd be helpful to get updates, thanks.

Rep Lippens?

Thank you. Through you, Madam Chair. I want to just applaud you for this wonderful PowerPoint. You're doing what I think our district is talking about which is investing in Thank you so much for joining us. Most effective and important determinant is high quality curriculum. So like my teacher had chuckled when you said that there's gonna be no new initiatives because it's so much work every year to change things, So high quality curriculum and then investing in it, we will continue to see gains. I know this is like very well studied so I'm Really happy to hear about that.

And the other thing I'm thinking about, I'm excited about the Barr Foundation grant I want to know specifically, while you mentioned that our principals are the instructional leaders of each school and they will be getting a lot of support. So are there systems... in place to allow them to fully embrace this opportunity because our principals are often the ones out on the playgrounds. You know, they're putting out fires. We're responsible for pre-K through eight. And I'm just wondering if we're investing so heavily Are there systems or things that we're doing as a district to make sure that we are getting the most from this opportunity? Like at a system level, not like day-to-day I guess.

I like to think that The design of our district is somewhat intentional and I'm benefiting from the years of investment that this committee actually has supported, like the fact that we have social workers Guidance, Counselors and Deans of Students and Redirects. And so that system actually is One way to actually create different streams of work for people to make sure that the work is done much more easily. And I think that the work around restorative justice, the work that we have done around Saretta Hammond in terms of like how do we establish work in partnership with the students. All that also is built-in, in a sense that it minimizes also the impact of behavior has on the day of the principal

I was a principal for many years and that's one of the things that actually takes the biggest grant of their work which is attending to discipline issues, attending to issues with I believe that the system that we have, and we continue to tweak, so in terms of student services, we have reinforced that work. In terms of social-emotional services, And the next question is, how do we integrate all these pieces? Is the work that we're doing with TNTP and some of the other providers. I feel that as you probably know The work that the Lynch Academy has been doing, the principals love it. The assistant principals are getting the same training and so I think all of that is being integrated and the question that is a little bit different for us

then how do I support them which now we narrow down the support so i will be working with a smaller group of folks so i can be there more present and also we are looking at data and determining how do we know that the things that we're doing are really working How do we know that the support I provide makes sense? And so, I think the work is much more sophisticated towards making sure everyone is an instructional leader. There are multiple things that we're doing also internally. The schedules that we have, how do we make sure the cycles of support are there? How do we also support the principals to address the attention of things that are happening is that something that the principal should be doing it there's someone else that should be and how do we train this staff who else can be collaborating with the principal so All those questions are in my mind. I don't have a recipe for how we actually get into each one of those, but that is the work.

So what I hear is that this is definitely on your radar and you're being flexible. And it seems like you're using data and seeing how like the systems that we have how are they going to work you're there working with a smaller group did I get that right? I probably missed some other things all right thank you.

Thank you We're at Eldridge.

I'm wondering, it seemed we've talked... I guess we've heard a little bit about open architects and how helpful that's been It seems like that's going to play into a lot of this following and data work. Could you maybe touch on a little bit about how Open Architects is going to support this larger work in systems that y'all are putting in place? And also, or if there's a possibility that parents might be able to tap into that information and data as well.

Thank you for the question. Open Architects has been amazing I can imagine that it's going to play a central role It really takes the The guessing out of it and allows you to focus your time on what to do about the data instead of like, what is the data that I'm looking at? So I can imagine to your question of like what role will it play. I could imagine it playing a central role I think there are a number of ways in which we plan on using open architects with our teams. I'm thinking about specifically as we think about the principal team. coming having some key questions and this is something that we a practice that we've done but not asked consistently. Key questions to help guide through open architects for example, and to lead us through kind of A spiral of inquiry as it relates to the data and using open architects to lead that.

So, it will be a central role. It will be guided... I mean Sam Elegian who you all know is incredible and will play a lead role in this. I'm really excited that our Chief of Strategy and Operations, Dr. Sannin also has deep I'm really excited for both of them to play a key role in strengthening our systems around data. As it relates to families engaging, I know that we have been thinking about how to enhance the strategic plan strategic plan family database and what other data we can bring in there. We had a conversation around looking at Dibbles, for example, given that MCAS starts at grade three. And so that kind of looks like four families

I want to know younger than grade three, what does that look like? So that's something we're actively exploring and what that might look like. I don't know. We're also, I mean, I'm open. I want to make this a partnership that feels open, transparent and collaborative in a way that we can kind of move forward together so If you do have ideas beyond that, I would love to hear those.

Yeah, so Open Architects has also different constituent-facing models. So they have family components. They have teacher components. It's a matter of exploring and determining what's the infrastructure. I'm assuming cost is one piece of that, and also we need to do a better job educating the community as to how do we understand the data that we have in front of us. but I think that that's not far from what and one of the things that we have said as one of our core values is that we want to make sure that folks understand that we wanna be transparent, and also that we serve the community in a way that makes sense for them. I also just wanted to highlight because i don't want to miss this is like the teachers have been at the center of the greatest Transformation, if you will. We have had so much content that we have put in front of them and I can tell you that Most districts, if you come up with one program, you get a lot of resistance.

We have done programs in math literacy science social studies and the way that relationship has worked, every single day I think is a gift. And again, just getting to know one program it takes a couple of years. It takes three years for you to actually make it your own and be able Create novel ways to support every kid. So I also want to, it's not like let's wait and see but let's continue to do this work And as I said to you there is excellence in many classrooms as a matter of replicating that excellence

Thank you. Okay, I think anything else on the district report? We're onto personnel then. All right, thank you.

Personal Report, here we are. So as you know, we have multiple translations throughout the year and a lot of retirements and resignations and assignments. and I'm going to share them for the month of June, July and August. So we have retirements. We have Joan Tadeo she is from the Winter Hill 27 years of service Kim Murphy-Baker from the West, 33 years of service and Joanne Driscoll Dwyer five years from the Healy. So please help me congratulate each one. We're really proud of the commitment that they have had in our district and the years of service. So we have some reassignments, and also some promotional opportunities that have happened in 26-27 I'm going to start with central office. We have Margaret DePasquale, she is the new director of student services. Stephanie Lugo our new assistant director of Student Services

Patrick Mello, the new assistant principal at The Next Wave Full Circle. Lindsay Weaver, new assistant principle at The West. She was formerly as the assistant for the SEU or the vice president of the SEUs, right? Sorry. So we're really excited to have her in our ranks. Kayla Mejia, she is also the interim theater teacher at the Winter Hill. We have Jennifer Martinez, the new head cleric at The East. Margaret Bolt, the dean of students at The Healy. Jennifer Miranda, the interim ESL specialist at Winterhill. And now we have the new administrative hires. We have Mikali Sanon, our chief of strategy and operations. Really excited to be working along with her. and many more.

More excited about that way in which we are framing the work around equity. Amelia Gorman, Director of Early Education and Care. And Shayla Jacob Ahmed, she is the Assistant Principal at Healy. We have Josephine Rizzo, the HR Specialist. Christopher Bruno, Payroll Operations and Analytics Manager. Patricia Brady, the ESL Department Chair of The High School. Hania Lohr, the Dean of Students at the High School Elm Community. Nathaniel Hoston, the Special Education Department Chair at Winter Hill and Healy and Camila Estevez-Silva, social worker at the Office of Basic Nates and Housing Support Services. She is basically replacing Jennifer Ochoa. and Olivia Livera. She is the head clerk at Winterhill, and of course she's replacing Nancy McSweeney. And we have some resignations. We have Brendan Sullivan, she's an empire professional at the Winterhill.

Sabrina Soriano, she was a math teacher at the Healy. Anna Stolberg, she was a special education teacher at the Kennedy Irma Calderon. She was the head clerk at the high school Deborah Nixon, Literary Library Media Specialist at the Winter Hill. Brittany Stane, she was at The West, SPED Director, Rishon's room teacher and Kenneth Peterson, plumbing instructor at the high school. So, that is the list of HR. Someone asked me how many openings do we have and I just wanted to make sure that I had the latest numbers in front of me so Karen reminded me and said we basically have some six eight unit Educator positions that basically because of some of these transitions have created some openings. Two SEU unit C teachers, so two paraprofessionals and to union scale position.

So that's it, so we are fully staffed if you will. Thank you!

I also want to note while for those of us who have lost educators and administrators who we've appreciated as they have grown in the district There are a few who personally broke my heart, but I'm also appreciative and proud of the district in watching their growth. What I hear in that is that we are supporting our educators to become our administrators and our counselors and other support staff. And growing from within, which I think you know Aids and Institutional Knowledge, Has Children Feeling Seen and Cared For? And I think should be a point of pride. Anything else?

No, that's it.

OK. Does anyone else have any comment on personnel? Rep Lippens.

Thank you, Chair. This is just a quick shout out that I've met several former Somerville Public Schools students who are now in positions and work for our district and every time they're just so happy and thankful and gushing over their experience which is really a testament to Somerville Public Schools. So thank you.

Beautifully stated, thank you Okay, with that we are going to pivot to Roman numeral four report of subcommittees. Please correct me if I am wrong. We do not have an ed program, so A will be punted till our next meeting. We have finance and we have three rules. So I'm looking for a motion to approve Finance and Facilities from June 17th, Rules from June 15th, rules from July 9th, and rules from August 20th.

So moved with gratitude to my colleagues on rules who decided to meet over the summer.

Second.

All right, I have a motion by member Rep Biton seconded by Rep Green Any comments? All those in favor? Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? Okay. Thank you for that. And there will be more next meeting. We are on to our new business. Do I have a motion for field trips?

Motion to approve the field trip for September 23rd, 2026 through September 25th, 2027. Do I read where they're going? We're 56 sixth grade students from the Argenziano School to visit Nietzsche's classroom in Groton, Mass. Travel Via Bus, Student Cause $0. Thank you to our wonderful PTA who will fund all students.

Second.

All right, I have a motion by Rep. Lippens seconded by Vice Chair Biton. Are there any questions? All those in favor aye all opposed any abstentions okay We have a high school diploma. Who's going for it?

for a Somerville High School Diploma, for Kadnan Sait.

All right, I have a motion by Dr. Stellman, seconded by Vice Chair Biton. All those in favor? Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? All right. Congratulations. Those are always so lovely. All right, we are looking at the Somerville Public Schools Policy Manual. This is a first reading of file JKAA around timeout, seclusion and physical restraints of students. I'm going to kick it over to our rules chair.

All right thank you Chair so In your packets tonight, you have a copy of JKAA which is Time Out Seclusion and Physical Restraint of Students. This is a template policy provided to us by MASC. There was an update at DESE that required That districts have this in place for the beginning of this school year. Now, here we are at the beginning the school year We do not have this yet in place but to facilitate the expeditious adoption of this policy The intention was while we are

making sure that this policy fits our district and working out any feedback so right now this is getting administrative feedback but we thought it best to Pass it along to the full committee for a first reading while we continue to deliberate this in rules. and then bring it back to the full committee with the final feedback when we have that ready. So this was really to speed it along.

Thank you, Rep Green?

Thank you. Through you, I was just confused. This is a new policy or is this... So can we see the changes to the existing policy? I just want to know where we stand in context.

Dr. Stellman?

Through you, to my colleague. I sit on the policy and rules committee just so you know with Rep. Lippens as well, so we can share the differences what with the Massachusetts Association of School Committees and our Department of Elementary and Secondary Education are requiring really specific We didn't really have a lot of wiggle room, but I do think it's useful to see the before and after so we can share that. Does that...

I'm of the opinion that won't delay taking a vote again at our next meeting, but it's something we can have in the packet as soon as it's available.

Precisely because there's so much that is required and we're changing things, just understanding the context in which this new policy lives would be super helpful for me.

Repihan, Biton.

Thank you chair through you yeah just building on Dr. Stellman's points and she said it perfectly but Our policy, JKAA that's on file right now. You're right it is an existing policy. It is fairly short. It was adopted in 2015. I'm happy to do a I will have something more in the packet when we bring it back. Call up Dr. Selman?

Yes, I wanted also to point out that we have our team on this committee has made it really important for us to make sure that our key stakeholders through our communications person Daryl Nash that those stakeholders are aware of all of the changes and even if these are policy language that comes from DESE and MASC It doesn't preclude us from making changes that are bespoke to our district. So I just wanted to put that nuance in because it I think the way I said it and if I had been listening to myself, I would say oh well they're just taking boilerplate and putting it in which is not terrible especially if DESE requires it.

but it's an opportunity for us to make sure that our highly experienced and trained educators have a voice and can make changes and I'll just say one more thing we've uncovered many odd turns of language that are Outdated and worse. And so I think it is really important for us to do the deep dive and I think comparing the before and after is critical for eyes outside of our own because we may take away something that actually was had a really important piece in there and we wouldn't know because we're not their practitioners.

Thank you, Rhett Pitone?

Thank you through you. So just to make sure I understand this, the version in here is the version we got from MASC. There's like two or three little red line edits that are just language changes Okay, and that in for our next packet we're going to have the old version and the new version which is helpful. I think that's what Rep Green asked for and This is a very dense, obviously very important and very specific policy. So in any way that There can be sort of a roll-up summary for, like obviously we're going to read it. I've read it and I will read it again but to make sure that we're understanding how this is shifted kind of as a concept would be really helpful so thank you Thank you, Rep Green.

Thank you and building off that also would be helpful to know to Dr. Stoneman's point what is required and what isn't like If there are places where there is nuance and flexibility, et cetera, knowing what that is versus no this is the stuff we just have to do. It's helpful for understanding what our options are.

Rob Eldridge

So I guess I also want to say because this is a first reading and we'll vote at this in the next meeting if someone could refresh my memory of what that date is. I'm not 100% off top of my head. and because there wasn't public comment to participate in like or to share any feedback on this specific JKA how can community members provide feedback to The Rules Committee if they want to just provide input or lived experience or whatever it may be for consideration when it comes to JKAA.

So, if I may? Thank you, Chair. Through you and this may affect how we decide to time the second reading our next rule subcommittee meeting is Immediately before our next full committee meeting, so we may want to stagger that slightly to avoid I think we'll need to. So it may actually be early October before we can bring this up for second reading. That said, Anyone who's interested in submitting comments on this policy should hopefully will have a public comment availability at our next meeting and also send us an email. Talk, speak to your school committee member and have them provide feedback that way.

They can send me an email so all of our contact information is on the website please reach out I definitely welcome feedback from my colleagues, from the public. And for reference Rep Lippens and Dr. Stellman are the other members on this school committee, on the rules subcommittee.

Yes, and that is listed on our website. Great. Anything else? Thank you. We will have a second reading at some point. All right. and you know as just to echo what the vice chair said like He has been leading a yeoman's effort to update language intent, like really pour through our policies and make sure that they are in line with our values and our actions. Hats off to you and to the members. And please keep up the good work. All right, we are on to item D, The Cummings School Warming Center MOU. That was in the packet. Are there questions?

The vote would be to authorize the chair to sign it because we typically do a first reading and second reading. I would encourage the body to, you know... Wait until at least our next meeting to have a vote, but definitely always open to conversation and questions. Rep Biton.

Thank you, Chair. Through you quick question about the timing of the MOU it seemed to have a start date in September 2026, that's tomorrow. So if we're not voting on it tonight I guess is this retroactively? Effective to tomorrow, right? Assuming we don't get to it until our next meeting. Will the work and the city operations assumed to be happening under this MOU be going ahead regardless between now and our next meeting? Just curious about that.

Mayor Wilson. Chair 3, appreciate that question. There's not that much work that needs to happen at this point it's pretty much ready to go the work will need to happen probably shortly before the weather turns very cold so I don't anticipate anyone needing to be in there and do anything in the meantime but good question

Rep Green.

So when we approached this last year, there was much concern around emergency building plans and to make progress on it. As the comments in here say, we still haven't seen that plan so I do want to flag that before I vote to approve this. And also, I would just love to get an update on how this has been working and some data on the outcomes. Are we doing it for two winners? Et cetera. Obviously, as I've said every year, of course we're going to improve it. I'm not going to have people freezing Thank you. Mayor Wilson?

Chair, through you. Yeah, always happy to share info on that. There is data that can be pretty easily shared from HHS and emergency management on that I'll just say my long-term plan is to find a different spot for the warming center. I think it makes a lot more sense to have this where the people are, not in any residential neighborhood We pushed hard to try to move that in time for this winter. We didn't have enough time to come in and do that so we're gonna keep trying to fight and find a spot that I think makes a lot more sense than Prescott Street

All right, so this is something we will vote on in a future meeting certainly before it gets cold. Alright, we're onto item E, acceptance of grant funds. Do I have a motion?

Chair, I move to accept all federal entitlement and continuation grants and all state continuation grants awarded to the Somerville Public Schools. Listed as follows, private grants. The Morris Bender Foundation to the Argenziano School valued at $12,500 State grants, the Metro North Regional to scale Pac-Man follow up of $6000. Adult Ed and Family Literacy to scale of $732,519. Wow. And federal grants, adult ed and family literacy also to scale at a value of $183,130. Thank you Jocelyn.

Yeah, props to the skill director. I have a motion by Reputone. Do I have second? Seconded by Rep Eldridge. Member Pitone, or Rep Piton?

Through you. I'm just curious are these additive grants or are these the operating grants that we use?

Thank you to the chair. These are the entitlement grants, so these are the operational grants. These title grants under Title II. That's right, these are grants that we use for our operations for scale.

So just to follow up, it would be helpful when we see these if there can just I don't know not wanting to create work but notation so we know what are traditional operating grants and So for example, Rep. Biton was excited I was like well these are the grants that we can't operate without these We have to fund them this way but we do know that SCALE has been doing a fantastic job of getting additive grants to create an additional program so anytime we can highlight those versus operational grants that's helpful at least to me thank you great point uh thank you rep green

Actually, building on Pitone's point because I was going to make a similar one. It would also be great if we could see like the five-year history of these grants. I know that immediately after the pandemic for – because these are oftentimes enrollment based grants there was a huge hit to those grants and I'd just like to know where we've been since then.

Thank you. All right, I have a motion by Rep. Biton seconded by Rep Eldridge All those in favor? Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? Alright, we're excited to keep scale going. For unfinished business we have an MSBA update

Yeah, through the chair. We all know I think that we reach a milestone by submitting their preferred schematic report and I believe all of you were aware of that We have a day coming up in probably September 16 or September 31st when we will be in front of MSBA. and we'll respond to the questions around the educational programming as well as the design that we have. I will be there with, I'm assuming the mayor will be The architects. And so that's the next phase where we'll be making a case for the work that we have done so far We're excited about this part of the work I believe there will be a vote expected by all of you on October 28th And then the next phase is the schematic design. So we're assuming that this, we anticipate that this phase of the program will move forward

and then after that is the next phase is this schematic design. And I know that you will be asked to review the schematic design document once it is completed, and there's an approval day in February for that schematic design and I also know that we have shared with you the ad hoc committee around The piece around the catchment area or the catchments zones is something that continues to be part of the conversation as well. I think that's it and we will continue with the community engagement as well. So, that is an ongoing process and again we meet regularly Building Committee also on a monthly basis just to make sure that all the work is on track.

Yes, to follow up on that the School Assignment Advisory Committee is close to being finalized. I'm very thankful. I think it is okay to announce it will be chaired by Rep Green. Vice Chair's going to be Rep Pitone Um... and we're very excited to get that up and running next month, which is also in about five hours. So we're excited because we know that was part of our agreement and I appreciate the grace from those who are excited for it to get it underway. We're almost there and we are very excited and humbled by the willingness of our community, of our educators, of administrators and the enthusiasm to like do this really hard thoughtful work I really it humbling is the only word I can think of

All right, so we're going to jump back to community calendar items from committee members. Mayor Wilson, before you got here I used Roman numeral seven out of order to discuss why there was no public comment tonight. The sort of Short of it is that we noted because the microphone can't be muted from up here, it exposes the body To a legal liability that we don't feel safe being exposed to, but we do deeply value the public comment that we have from our community and from Our SEU members and other union members. And So I sort of highlighted what the options were made available to us, but noted that the district was asked to fund an alternate mic.

Raffone option and that you know because that is a reallocation of funds from the budget that we initially approved I felt it was important to bring in front of the body um President Davis said you know that he this was just brought to his attention yesterday. He thought that the three of us could have a conversation in order to get this underway without having to reallocate those funds but I just In case there was something else you want to add, I don't want you to feel that this was done without you.

Mayor Wilson? Yeah, Chair, I appreciate that. Sorry I was running late. I was coming from a couple events in Davis Square. Yeah, I remember a number of years back when the situation arose with that asking the city clerk about that and being told oh somehow the wires were buried Prohibitively expensive and difficult to troubleshoot. I followed up today to see what went into that, is it possible just replace the mechanism up there with a button on it? I got a confirmation that we'd re-examine this so Yeah, I'm here for that conversation and I'd love to get that fixed.

Wonderful. I want to note that we are I'm enthusiastic to get it fixed as quickly as possible. I think also, to what the members have said, should it not be fixed by the next meeting, City staff to figure out if everyone has to be on Zoom or something, we will make that work obviously in the interim. But I appreciate your willingness to partner with us Since we're back at it, are there community or calendar items from members that were not reputone?

Thank you. Through you, I just wanted to confirm again, we weren't told it was $1 million. It was $2,000 and I just made the point and I'm sure well I'm not sure I imagine some other people feel this is like a facility issue in the city not necessarily something distinct to the school committee. This is a function of this building so you know If the school committee has to consider reallocation we would but I'm hoping that the city could manage to fund fixing City Hall and the chambers to work the way they're supposed to work.

Thank you. Dr. Boston Davis?

I just have one additional update that didn't want to forget, which is that we are very excited that our rock climbing wall is going to be up and running. And... They will be our educators. and the K-12 Department Chair of Health and PE will be featured on Channel 5 News at 6.15 in the morning tomorrow, so that's a call out for anybody to watch. They have a welcome like a small welcome Channel 5 News 6.15 a.m. tomorrow So tune in.

That is a lovely and exciting community note, you know since we've had to Approve the insurance for that rock wall year after year without it being utilized. It is such awesome news that we are spending the money and ensuring something that is getting utilized. Thank you. All right. Our upcoming meeting topics in September we will have an enrollment update and a school readiness update from DPW and IAM. Just as a note for the community, these are pretty typical updates that we get in early fall and we look forward to it. Mayor Wilson.

Chair, sorry if I missed the opportunity for a community calendar note, but I'll just point out fall varsity sports are starting up and JV. Check Arbiter, we'd love to see the community out supporting our student athletes.

Forgive me, what do you mean by Czech Arbiter?

Chair, Arbitor is the website and app that are used to keep the calendar of everything from practices to games for our athletics program.

Great, so please cheer on Highlanders however you can. Thank you. All right with that we are onto condolences.

All right. The school committee offers its deepest condolences to the families of Eleanor T. Ellie Blute, Retired September 9, 2008 Parent Coordinator Tier 1 at the Winterhill Innovation Community Schools Brenda Horowitz Mother to Michael Horowitz OST Site Director at the Capuano Manuel Centeo, grandfather of Kayla Centejo, health coordinator for the Somerville Public Schools. Jose Joe Natalino Cardoso, father of Jennifer Quinlan, MLE teacher at the Argenziano School and husband Teresa Cardoso, school committee member for the Somerville Public Schools for more than 20 years.

Jerry H. Burke, father of Ellie Burke ESL specialist at the East Somerville Community School Thomas N. McLaren Employee of the Summer Public Schools from 1988 to 1991, serving as an art teacher at the Kennedy and substitute teacher district-wide, father of Layla McLaren, District Substitute and Afterschool Behavior Specialist at Argenziano. husband of Wanda Finnegan McLaren special education 1988 to 2025, 20 years at the Kennedy and 17 years at Healy. Currently part-time Argenziano Charles E. McElroy Sr., father of Richard McElroye, Somerville High School CTE instructor in the Graphic Design and Visual Communications Department

We are returned. Thank you.