Beebe School (20 minutes)

Transcript (~59 min @ 54:30)

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▶ 54:27 Jennifer McAndrew: seeing that all in favor and that motion carries unanimously with one absent thank you that concludes our fnf business for tonight see you next time thank you ms mcandrew that brings us

▶ 54:34 Speaker 1: to educational programs and personnel with mr selm thank you very much mr chair tonight's

▶ 54:55 Speaker 2: educational programs and personnel discussion is the bb school as we had a packet introduced to us last meeting and as we have been receiving numerous questions from the public both concerns suggestions and individually our own conversations with the superintendent on this and as we have a public forum one week from tonight in the learning Commons at 7 o'clock and as no new information has been added to the packet I would like to open up the floor to each of you individually to ask the superintendent questions that and concerns that have spoken to you on behalf of the public to better preface the meeting that we will have the public form we will have in one week so again at this time the floor is open as going against what has been customary is letting the superintendent introduce the topic I believe we all understand the topic I would just open up the floor to

▶ 56:08 Speaker 1: actual conversation mr. Abrams key please would it be possible to take a look at the two models that we have and look at an option of saying if we moved the entire kindergarten to the Beebe in the Franklin and then grew it out and and started to return kindergarteners back to their home schools say and what I mean by that is so next year we would go with the model with the kindergarten and then eventually in the following year that it would be a kindergarten grade one and you'd move some kids back at the BB only we're talking right yeah

▶ 56:46 Speaker 4: okay yes so again the limitations of the BB is we're currently running actually 16 kindergartens we're running 15 kindergarten plus a special education program that is kindergarten based that we added this year at the Franklin so I need 16 kindergarten rooms okay right at the BB I have 12 classrooms and two specialty rooms so again space is always our problem we looked at so many configurations so again as the committee knows this has been space has been a topic since 2014 the file that is sitting here next to me is the running file I keep of all the meetings and plans and everything else we've done so So beginning in 2014, we began to talk about space. In 2016, it became critical, and we ended up with the module. At that point in time when I presented, I was asked to present by this committee all the options. I presented nine options. Quite frankly, of those nine options, two thirds of them were not viable for a number of reasons, okay? You're in a similar situation again. team has run through many many options it comes down to space economics in time

▶ 58:24 Speaker 4: that's what it comes down to right now and I discussed this this morning with the PTO the citywide PTO we had a wonderful conversation about it at the Winthrop we converted a storage space next to the boiler room into the music room there is no music room there okay we converted two years ago we've converted a book closet we ran ventilation and converted it to a special ed room okay their art room is half the size of any other art room and we took part of that to create smaller office spaces because that's the only

▶ 59:11 Speaker 4: way we could get an art room it went through all right we we moved a teacher teacher out of an undersized room and moved, I'm looking at the Winthrop teachers to cue me. Two or three sped teachers are now sharing a room, three sped teachers are now sharing a room. That's the Winthrop by itself, and that's with two modules added on, all right? I can run that scenario for every building in the district. Hoover, excuse me, Harvest Man, which is beautiful renovations, library is probably the size of a small office okay when we put 24 fifth graders in there it's not a room you really want to sit in okay we have a combined music art room that when the music teacher comes in we push the tables away Lincoln

▶ 1:00:10 Speaker 4: we just put a wall up to create a music room that is a very funky I want to say it's like a misshapen V that the music teacher does a fabulous job making the best use of that room I was so impressed when I saw what she did the same thing there we are totally out of space in so many aspects because we fix we've had to expand special ed programs at the Lincoln we added two more special ed programs we have to take classroom space okay I'm going through my head through my rooms at the Roosevelt the music room is the converted teachers room work room right we had to take all the significant sped rooms put them in one big room move the OTPT equipment to a smaller room and put three teachers in one big room at Roosevelt to share that space. What building am I leaving out? Hoover. We took the oversized kindergarten room three years ago, cut it in half. One half has a semi-wall where two SPED teachers share the room. The other half, again, the size of a small office, is the art music room taking turns. This is with three modules. Anywhere you look, we're out

▶ 1:01:38 Speaker 4: of space so the district can make a choice to do out on a cart music on a cart at the Roosevelt and the Lincoln we could take the art rooms and use those for classrooms but that's a choice that this committee would have to make we have currently a 15 stranded K a 15 stranded to a 15 stranded three of 15 all who have to come up through the district, okay? So moving them to as a whole five, a whole K to BB was considered and it's a difficult choice. You could do it, you could have large class sizes, you could have no specialty space if that's what the district chooses, okay? Before I go much further in this questioning with everybody, and I'm very happy to answer your questions. Some of you have discussed some of the stuff with me over the course of the past year and a half. At no point do I doubt my teacher's ability to deliver a first class education, no matter what circumstances I put them in, okay? They have lived through construction, they have lived with sharing rooms, they have lived with less than ideal heating crack and drafted windows you know I don't doubt at all their ability okay so again this is not about the teaching and this is not about the actual educational program this is about space money and logistics at this point in time at this point okay does that answer your question thank you miss McAndrew please

▶ 1:03:27 Jennifer McAndrew: thank you so I just if I could just take a second I just want to talk about for one minute about how I'm thinking about this issue and the different sort of categories I'm thinking about I do have questions in each one and I'm not necessarily suggesting that I go through them all tonight I know we have other opportunities but just to put them in this frame so I'm really thinking about four categories of questions and I want to thank everyone who's written to us or spoke tonight or talk to me on the phone email text you know just keep being in touch with us I find it really helpful for myself I'm framing this in sort of four categories of the first one is educational programming and outcomes because I think that that really is what our job is here or main part of our job at the school committee is to decide about what are the best educational models and why are we looking at these models why are these two models and options before us the best educational models as opposed to say consolidating the fifth grade or consolidating the sixth grade or something like that the second category is what I'm the sort of class size family choice placement group of questions I think we should talk more about how these plans reduce or redistribute class size what would be the impact of moving K out of some buildings for example and also that the impact of consolidating the K on the other classes on the other schools the third category I'm thinking about is cost each of these cat each of these options carry specific costs that we heard about in the presentation but they're also overarching costs to both proposals and I think that placing the options within that wider context is important and um and then the fourth category i'm thinking about is the transition so whichever option the committee decides there are going to be many decisions after that point which i think are as important as this one um and we need a plan for how we're going to make all those decisions and communicate them to the public so that's just a long-winded intro and i apologize for that but that's how i'm thinking about this so i think actually because we did just talk a lot about space and i think it's clear from your last answer that we all get that there's not enough space in the current buildings for many many reasons um so i wonder if and and i i you and i have talked about this and and i hope that i guess i'll just say i hope at the public forum next week that you will spend some time talking about the other options that you've looked at i know you've mentioned them here I know they were discussed in 2014 2016 but I do still think it's important to hear about them we may understand why we can't put all the fifth grade in one building because there's too many of them or soon will be but there also may be other reasons why that is was not considered and I think we should hear about it but maybe now I'll ask about class size so how can we talk about how these two plans would reduce or redistribute class size and in particular can you talk about if the under option two if the K removed out of the current buildings would that allow us to add additional strands or bubbles whatever you want to call them at certain grade levels at certain buildings as we've done in the past i mean that's the case now so some schools have four three three three four or something like that um and i guess related to that how many if any additional teachers or para would be then needed to meaning meaningfully reduce class size at the remaining one to five buildings

▶ 1:07:25 Jennifer McAndrew: if we know yeah I know we don't know because we don't have that all of the

▶ 1:07:36 Speaker 4: enrollment for next year but so the school committee policy is for us to try to balance class size to the best as we can as people register for the Melrose public schools okay so you literally know that you have a policy that says

▶ 1:07:52 Speaker 4: siblings first special programs whether they be special ed or ESL proximity and then then parents preference okay so sometimes we're successful at that

▶ 1:08:08 Speaker 4: balance and sometimes we're not as we know the Horace man has been in great demand for several years now and the the 2k teachers are looking at me and they have been very gracious to say to us you can maximize us but then just close us down and basically go away superintendent having said that there were 15 children who did not get Horace Mann as their choice this year so using HM as an example so they're running the two teachers that are at Horace Mann as of November 8th both had 24 kids in their case so somebody can do the math

▶ 1:08:56 Speaker 4: that's 48 plus another 15 is 48 is 58 is 66 is my math right 63 thank you

▶ 1:09:14 Speaker 4: somebody out back so if I had space at the Horace Mann I could conceivably have three K three grade ones there if I had no case there and I could have three grade ones of 21 that's conceivable all right similarly at Roosevelt 22 families did not get their choice that's a whole class so if you don't have your case there could you put another class there and have a bubble or a whatever a fourth class that is possible the piece that we would have to see how it plays out is what is the impact across the city because those 22 children who did not get their choice at Rosie and the 15 who did not get their choice at Horace Mann went somewhere so then if those families go to their first choice what is the impact as it as it floats across the city but that is one way for people to get more of their choice and I think I referenced that in one of the slides that this could be possibly big so did that answer your question yeah so you're

▶ 1:10:16 Jennifer McAndrew: saying that so at the horse man you could have three first grades right and

▶ 1:10:23 Speaker 4: and then the following year depending on the population you could have three first grades

▶ 1:10:25 Jennifer McAndrew: again and three second grades but then eventually those classrooms are full there and you right and

▶ 1:10:30 Speaker 4: then you're into the same situation right and so that would conceivably and this leads a little bit

▶ 1:10:35 Jennifer McAndrew: into the cost question that it could be the case that we are hiring additional staff right at those buildings it could also be the case that we are not filling every single one of those classrooms at those buildings because we're using them for say reclaiming the music room the library etc all of that maybe depending on what it is right could require additional staff as well so i think it's important to to for us to acknowledge i know we don't know the exact cost because we don't necessarily but that those that option does have other costs that might not be

▶ 1:11:13 Speaker 4: captured in the presentation now and i think when we did the presentation we said it was our best estimate at this time based on on what was in front of you there are there are unknowns here but there's unknowns every year right right I mean every year when we make that decision in June whether to add that 15th K we're gambling based on

▶ 1:11:37 Jennifer McAndrew: past trends can you talk this is my last question for now I don't want to take up all the time but um can you talk a little bit more about the kindergarten experience and why the option of the pre-k K is is in your view if it is I'm assuming it is based on what you said previously would be valuable for

▶ 1:12:02 Speaker 4: kindergarten learners okay do you mind if I call forth my K experts no you can do what you want I have my other K experts they are what they all want like which one like not us if any of you want to speak um um so um i'm asking because we have heard a lot

▶ 1:12:26 Jennifer McAndrew: of comments tonight and elsewhere that moving the kindergartners out could be detrimental to them in some way because they won't have the mentorship of older students for example or that might be detrimental to the older students because they don't have opportunities to mentor and i i see that point as an elementary parent myself so I'm just asking I think I'd like to hear about what you see as the benefits to kindergarten kindergartners of keeping them with preschool and pre-k I will say you surprised me I thought

▶ 1:12:55 Speaker 6: you were calling on kindergarten teachers I think the kindergarten teachers would agree with me though that the social emotional needs of our students have certainly changed not just at the pre-k level but at the kindergarten level and I think having them what I have seen in the last year having an opportunity to have some of our students who had gone on to kindergarten and then needed to return to us back into kindergarten it is a quieter smaller environment with other children who are developmentally in that same age level it reduced it just in and of itself reduced the stress for those students and so they were able to perform I know it's a small sample but we definitely have seen in every one of our buildings an increase particularly at the kindergarten level of students who are having a difficult time with the

▶ 1:14:02 Jennifer McAndrew: social-emotional regulation and could sorry just one lesson could you speak to the transition then to first grade and because that's another thing that we've heard uh concerns about from parents is then how and i know i'm not i'm asking you to to imagine yourselves in a scenario that doesn't exist and then predict the future so i get that that's two hard things but um how you would imagine that um uh both for a student who might be with you for three years or i know you have students who have been with you for three years donna at the ecc going to first um or a student who maybe is only with you for one year for kindergarten

▶ 1:14:43 Speaker 6: and then going to first so we have had all of those experiences i know um last year with our current for the students who went off to first grade this year from the franklin um there were no families who chose last year chose franklin as an option so So they were understandably anxious going into that first year as kindergarten families. Then by the beginning of September, October, they wanted to meet and hear about what were the plans for the district for these students to move on to first grade. We met with them in early January and had great conversation. Mr. O'Connell joined us, and we surveyed them early on and made sure that they got the information early in February about what that transition would look like. The elementary team of administrators worked really closely together, and they were very much on board with having the current kindergarten student families at the Franklin going to participate and getting to go through the tours again, even though they had joined as incoming kindergartners they wanted to go through that again this year when I met with the administrative team they want to expand that opportunity where last year they got to join the the families got to join in with the kindergarten families they want to have that same opportunity but then also to answer and address their individual questions each principal did something a little different to address the needs of those incoming first grade but they from all reports that i have received from families they were graciously welcomed into the schools and the principals did lots of different things they included them with pto open houses in the during the summer at the end of june they also had welcome back first grade families to be able to get to know other families there and have acclimated i think the superintendent and i met with many families who were not didn't get the choice they wanted until pretty late in the summer and they some change made their decision to either stick with the choice that they were given or even make that adjustment and even those families are expressing they were pleased with that transition

▶ 1:17:29 Speaker 4: process thank you it's really helpful thank you miss mcandrew anyone else from the floor

▶ 1:17:36 Speaker 1: mr o'connell please thank you madam chair um superintendent can you talk a bit about if we went with the k-5 at the bb what the reassignment process would look like how that

▶ 1:17:49 Speaker 4: I can release Ms. White-Lambright and Ms. Rousseau.

▶ 1:17:51 Speaker 1: Please, please. Thank you both very much.

▶ 1:17:54 Speaker 4: With thanks.

▶ 1:17:57 Speaker 4: So again, as you know, we, I sent out a reminder letter to families about the forum next week and we included a Google form for families to say if they volunteer, would they volunteer. So that's your first step. After that, you begin to do a process very similar to the process that we do for placement. You begin to look at proximity, and you begin to look at special circumstances. If possible, if we have the records, we try to reach out to people who maybe did not get their first choices, but it's not an easy situation. My understanding is when we did it in reverse for when we closed Beebe 17 years ago, that it was a very unpleasant, anguished situation. There's just no easy way to do it. That's the bottom line here. Even if I look at proximity, you cannot take half a class from Roosevelt. Basically what you're looking to do is, so I don't have to find those numbers, when I look at so here it is I have so Rosie and Lincoln are the ones most most immediately impacted so when I look at the third grade and this is me the second grade and the third at both Roosevelt and Lincoln I have six classes with 23 kids so ideally you know let's say we want to get down to we start with saying let's get down to 20 kids because one of the objectives here is it gives us an opportunity to lower class size so that gives me nine eighteen kids that immediately can be pulled from Roosevelt and Lincoln to become BB's it would be

▶ 1:20:01 Speaker 4: third grade next year right so how do I make those choices obviously if you have siblings in the building I'm not going to take you out of a building in which have siblings unless I take the whole family out of the building it really becomes once you get past the volunteers there is no pleasant way to do this very

▶ 1:20:26 Speaker 1: good and understood a follow-up if I may madam chair on a separate vein people have asked about time and or commented about the timing and the process and what some have described as an accelerated process could you talk a little bit about that why why we're doing this now why we're at least planning at this point to have a vote in December and I guess beyond that how that ties into the bidding process someone asked about the bidding process

▶ 1:21:05 Speaker 4: tonight and as you know and I did mention at the last meeting this has been on the table for a very long time but everything depended on the override vote whether it was a feasible to even talk about BB we've been through it with our architect once we have a firm that we've used for many years in the city and John Schenna, Denise Gaffney, and I have been through the building with TAPE, and we

▶ 1:21:39 Speaker 4: have some initial estimates from them. I've asked Ms. Gaffney to see if we can go to a scope of service estimate, but the bid process is very real. If we do not publish the beginning of January, all right, and the bids are usually published for about six weeks, then you have opening your bids and then you begin your work, you're on a very tight schedule. Now, again, I've explained, we've done tight schedules before, Ms. Gaffey and I. Horace Mann was a tight schedule. The windows and doors at Hoover were a tight schedule. The science labs were all a tight schedule. We've done tight schedules before. That doesn't mean you're always successful, but thank God we have a good track record. But again, the objective would not be to create a Taj Mahal here. The objective here is to make it as functional as any of my other buildings. What does that mean? Clean, painted, plumbing's working, electricity's working. It's wired for technology. we have the furniture and technology we need in the building. That puts it on par, quite frankly, with my other buildings, with the exception of the Horace Mann, who had its first floor renovated, but not its second. Melrose does not own any Taj Mahals. I mean, the Lincoln and the Roosevelt are 20 years old already, believe it or not, 20 years old already. The work that needs to be done across all the districts, all the buildings in the district are part of the capital improvement plan. Almost every school in this district needs a roof. Almost every school in this district is looking at a boiler or something similar.

▶ 1:23:36 Speaker 4: Franklin needs windows, who else needed windows? I kept forgetting who else needed windows. Somebody else needed windows, okay? You and I just finished putting together our proposals for the Capital Improvement Committee. They are quite, quite extensive. I will tell you very honestly, I cannot justify making any building in this district a Taj Mahal, knowing how much work is needed in all eight buildings. You know, the resources are the resources of the resources, the pie is only so big. You're also working within the confines of a budget, is he still up in the back there? That's good, okay, just want to make sure he's still, thank you, want to make sure you're still listening. Well, it's two different things. Yeah, I know. All right, you're working in the confines of a city budget, which is very proud that we keep our debt to 5% of the city's operating budget. And a city that needs a safety building, a library repaired, memorial hall repaired, and multiple infrastructures. So you have to think about what is realistic to spend in the city. Now I know there are people who say the money shouldn't matter. The money does matter. We function within a city, and a city's limits. And so we have to be fiscally responsible in the choice we make. And so that's part of the situation here. So the bid process is coming upon us. But just as realistic is the fact that seam may not be out of there. But whether seam goes in 20 or in 21, we need to have a plan because, gee, wouldn't it be nice to have a whole year to do the repairs? It would be fabulous. If because seam doesn't get out of there till 21, that would be fabulous. But in any way you look at it, you need to know sooner than later what that scope of repairs is going to be. Who are you going to get for contractors, and what the costs are going to be?

▶ 1:25:41 Speaker 1: So as I understand it, at least at present, the goal in an ideal world is to have use of the building for next school year.

▶ 1:25:49 Speaker 4: That is the ideal because of the space issues we're facing.

▶ 1:26:00 Speaker 4: And again, somebody had said to me this morning, well, that's going to get to the high school. you look at the demographic studies which is all we can go by it doesn't really hit the high school to 22 23 but the reality is we're out of space at the high school now okay there are people doubled up on classes you know thank God we had some extra office space so when people they don't somebody doesn't have to sit in their room while somebody else is using it for teaching that's the worst thing you could do to another teacher but we've had a plan for that building since 2014 in 2014 before we knew about this as I refer to it this wave the permanent school building committee did a three okay thank you Steph we did a three phase did a three phase plan for the high school we were We're only able to afford one phase. I have the other two phases sitting right here with what were the estimates back then. My concern about those estimates is those were in a down market and we had good bids.

▶ 1:27:17 Speaker 4: In this current market, I am concerned about what we are going to get for our dollar as opposed to what we got for our dollar two years ago, four years ago, five years ago. But the plans for the high school are here, and they do include getting my offices out of there. But at that time, to move my offices elsewhere was $1.5 million. It's not, you know, it's not packing up a bunch of desks and moving them somewhere. It was $1.5 million to move my offices to another space.

▶ 1:27:50 Speaker 1: And that didn't include the cost of the space, is that right?

▶ 1:27:53 Speaker 4: And that didn't include the cost of the space. I hate to tell you where they were moving us. Right.

▶ 1:27:59 Speaker 1: be a domino effect across the city so in again not to beat this to death in terms of the timing i mean basically you work back from you know your end date right as i understand this so using september 1st as as the ideal end date in terms of getting back into the building we work back from that we have to have time for the bid process we have to have time for the work to be done and the planning for that work would have to consider that best case scenario at this point seen would still be in the building until June so you know really that leaves us in terms of chunks of time really the summer maybe vacation if you can get a contractor to work in that basis and maybe weekends if we can get a contractor and or DBW to get into the building so that's what gets us back to December just in terms of the timing of this am I right about that okay and we've done that before we've worked

▶ 1:28:54 Speaker 4: during vacations we've worked on weekends we worked after hours I mean we we did two huge projects in the high school while the kids were in the high school and the contractors had to work around the kids being in the high school they had to make sure that the heaviest work which was during school vacations didn't want blasting it was a very interesting experience about what they could do during MCAS and couldn't do during MCAS but we we've done this so we know it's doable the problem is when do you want to do it very good and now I'm

▶ 1:29:31 Speaker 1: sure I just have two more questions at this point so all of that said now I'm Superintendent is it fair to say that if you had more time to do this that might be well it's clearly fair to say it would be a different process this might

▶ 1:29:50 Speaker 4: be out of our control if we do not have an answer from seeing within the next couple of weeks I don't we will have the time frame in which to do this seem has an RFP out looking for more space they've had one bid that they have rejected because it was so astronomical that the trickle-down effect of that bid would be to triple our and it doesn't add excuse me add $2,000 to each of our tuitions that we paid a seam so it was you know and I do not vote on any of this when I'm at the seam boy I abstain from everything but so they are out to bid until November 15th and if they don't have somebody within the next week or so I don't know what to tell the committee I will say to you I still think you need to make a decision about what the program is going to be so that you can do the planning I think miss McAndrew said it she said regardless of what you decide for the plan all you've done is decide for the plan there are so many decisions secondary to that decision that will then have to be made

▶ 1:31:09 Speaker 1: okay so it sounds like that we'll have more information in terms of a seam update for the November 19th forum because that's beyond November 15 and then I think I've heard you say that if we don't have a fixed answer from seam by next month then this is all move is that right all right thank you

▶ 1:31:40 Speaker 3: appreciate it thank you mr. Thomas I'm just curious about another option so there's a lot of space at the Franklin in comparison to the amount of space at the BB there's 18 classrooms so just for the sake of discussion the Franklin would be large enough to hold an entire class across the district for instance

▶ 1:32:06 Speaker 3: the upcoming fifth graders could all go to the Franklin then all the students that are at the Franklin could go to the BB or we could shrink the people who are tuitioned in right so there's is that a plausible proposal no we rejected that

▶ 1:32:19 Speaker 4: proposal first of all I have to tell you how reluctant I am to move the fifth graders if I'm a fifth grader and I've spent six years waiting you get to the

▶ 1:32:33 Speaker 4: top of the heap in my building I can't do that to them I mean there is nothing like being the big man on campus in your building when you're in the fifth grade and there's all these traditions we have associated with each building with being a fifth grader that that's that's not an easy thing to do for those kids so So that's a consideration. The other consideration is the Franklin lot is not a good lot for big kids. We really don't have any fields. We use a common field out on Greenleaf that we share with the public. The playground is, you know the playground, which was purposely designed and built for OT and PT needs of little learners and I and you know everything we put forward there is going to be somebody who objects to it that's the reality of the situation of being a decision-maker and one of the objections I have heard on the Franklin is there are there are parents who have said to me I don't want fifth graders on the corner of Maine and Franklin you know that's their

▶ 1:33:46 Speaker 4: perception that's their concern and I have heard it as well you know but like I said whatever decision we make we are not going to be able to please everyone

▶ 1:33:57 Speaker 3: but it's physically viable to do that basically is viable but it's not a great

▶ 1:34:00 Speaker 4: place for fifth graders I also have a sneaky suspicion and I really I have to ask and wait to measure it I have a feeling that that Franklin's multipurpose room is the smallest one we have when I was in there the other day with Donna I just kept thinking this is this seems smaller to me in my other multi-purpose rooms and again that's gym space and lunch space okay thank you

▶ 1:34:34 Speaker 4: any further comment from the floor could I ask a follow-up please related to what

▶ 1:34:38 Speaker 1: Mr. Razzi-Thomas just asked. So, again, to clarify, all of the fifth grades could fit in the Franklin School, space-wise?

▶ 1:34:51 Speaker 4: Number of classrooms-wise. Mm-hmm.

▶ 1:34:56 Speaker 1: OK. And?

▶ 1:35:01 Speaker 4: So let me just throw the other kink in that.

▶ 1:35:08 Speaker 4: Right now, the Franklin is on a later start time my other buildings and we did that on purpose because parents said to us when we went to later start can you make an adjustment so we have more travel time and we did that can't do that with the fifth grade that would be a harder thing to do because of after-school programs lessons things like that and so I think

▶ 1:35:36 Speaker 4: about Franklin you know again as we talked about in this chamber two weeks ago if you do an aerial view of Melrose your schools are not evenly spaced

▶ 1:35:48 Speaker 4: that's the reality you got Hoover up there on the hill all right then all of a sudden you've got Lincoln BB Roosevelt then you swing around to Franklin Horace Mann and then you've got Winthrop not too bad between Horace Mann and Hoover but

▶ 1:36:10 Speaker 4: they're not evenly spaced so now all my fifth graders are at franklin miss mcandrew please

▶ 1:36:20 Speaker 5: can i just ask another follow-up on this question because i've heard this suggestion as well please

▶ 1:36:27 Jennifer McAndrew: would to my mind there would be detriments to having any one grade level all at one school because of accessibility needs is that another concern with the franklin thank you because even Even with the option two, which I share the concern for that option for the same reason, you would be at, have all the K, at least it would be at two buildings with more first floor access, for example. The Franklin does not have an elevator?

▶ 1:36:54 Speaker 4: No, the only two buildings in the city that have, elementary buildings in the city that have elevators are Lincoln and Roosevelt, so there is an accessibility issue. As you know, at the Winthrop, we had two kids with broken legs last year, and the teachers were phenomenal. In the middle of the year, we flipped one of the classrooms because we had no way for the student to get up and down the stairs. The other student chose to go up and down the stairs on his own.

▶ 1:37:28 Speaker 4: So accessibility is always an issue.

▶ 1:37:34 Speaker 4: at the franklin we have that first floor entry um and uh on their main floor their handicap

▶ 1:37:46 Speaker 4: accessible ramps and things like that bb bb we will we will have to build ramps seam has a ramp but dpw has told me um they don't think it's um appropriate please miss donahue so you mentioned

▶ 1:38:07 Speaker 3: the um like taking students from like for example the second or third grade from the roosevelt and the lincoln and putting them into a class at the bb but um how would that impact class sizes or like space issues of the one threat or the hoover or so would kids from that school not be moved to the bb or would they not be affected or how that

▶ 1:38:30 Speaker 4: works it's a it's a good question grace so um that was just an easy example so there's a domino effect here so if you went to if we take kids out of the lincoln and the roosevelt let's say we try to get those classes down to 18. and we have kids we our obligation is to even class size then we would begin to think about okay can we take kids from the winthrop who wanted to go to roosevelt but didn't get into the roosevelt could we take like two from each grade and then move them over to the Roosevelt bring the Roosevelt class size up to 20 so you have this constant domino effect around the city as you try to even the class size and try to respond to people who say well gee I never got my first choice two years ago three years ago four years ago maybe that's where I want to be so there's a lot of unforeseen here that we just can't predict right and so then you

▶ 1:39:27 Speaker 3: you would well then you would see kids who maybe have been at a certain school for a couple years and then they would get moved to a school that they initially wanted but maybe they had already spent time at this the school their place at so it the domino effect would then you know there'd be more and more kids who are being relocated then just those that's a possibility the

▶ 1:39:50 Speaker 4: other possibility is to leave the schools on even and let it and let it Might it sort itself out naturally over time? Those are the choices the committee will have to make because they have a policy here that says we are directed to balance class size to the best of our ability. I also have a second set of rules I operate under the teacher's contract requires us to keep class size below 25 to the best of our ability.

▶ 1:40:26 Speaker 4: Mr. Abramski, please.

▶ 1:40:28 Speaker 1: the superintendent i think you hit it on the head when you said you know it's going to be a difficult decision no matter what decision we make and uh you know in the district i work in there's pretty much two transitions i work in a i work in a k-8 building and then they go nine to twelve and that was specifically designed because of land space because there's no land space where i am and then my wife's district they have a k building and they have a one to three building and they have a four to five building and they have a six seven eight building and a nine to twelve building but they have a lot of space so they're able to do that and that district works very well as does the one that i'm in and um there's there's no perfect scenario it's really what what is available to us as a district as the district of melrose and uh my my son's option was well why don't you just turn it into a giant amici's dad and then everybody would be happy sort of explaining and this

▶ 1:41:28 Speaker 1: space is available yeah and i had to explain to him that's really not what we're going to be discussing but thank you for your help uh but i just wanted to point out and thank you for uh coming up with these scenarios and for um presenting to the public uh next week on this

▶ 1:41:48 Speaker 4: issue thank you we've talked about it in this chamber and you've sometimes heard from members of the audience about it there there is no compelling research on

▶ 1:42:05 Speaker 4: any one model districts make choices for a variety of reasons often it's space density philosophy of the school committee philosophy of the community but there is really no compelling research on any one model Bill Ricker just opened an 8 to 12 high school all right when we talked about bringing the fifth grade to the middle school in 2016 I mean I parents were very upset with us they could not understand that but as you say there are school districts that that have five through eight middle schools. There are school districts that have K-4 buildings, five, six buildings, seven, eight buildings, nine, 12 buildings. Why were those decisions made? Those decisions were made, quite frankly, about space,

▶ 1:42:57 Speaker 4: not because of any educational design. I've worked in a district that was a very traditional district. I've worked in a district that was K-8 buildings, nine, 12, like you. I worked in a district that was K-2, 3-5, 6-8, 9-12, and then I'm here, which is a more traditional model. But there is no compelling research saying that one is superior to the other. At the end of the day, it's the support from our families, and it's what these people do. That's what counts at the end of the day.

▶ 1:43:36 Speaker 1: Thank you.

▶ 1:43:41 Speaker 4: Mr. O'Connell, please.

▶ 1:43:42 Speaker 1: last one madam chair thank you and i know we're you know we've got meetings to go i know it's getting late and i know we've got a forum next week and we can delve into all of this much more deeply as a community if you could talk just a little bit uh superintendent about the again the transitions there's been a lot of concern raised about the impact on our young children our young students owing to multiple transitions um at the same time i've heard other people say that it's not a negative impact do you in your experience in my experience it's not

▶ 1:44:27 Speaker 4: in general let me say it is not a negative impact but as ms rosso referenced every child is different and we have to plan for that child accordingly I have kids who go from five to six who have a prior time when I worked in a district that was a k-2 3-5 and of course you had transition to K you had a transition to three you had a transition to six you had a transition to nine you had four transitions it was very individual also sometimes I would get surprised by the kid who flew through the k2 and then they hit grade three I'd go whoa where where did this little one come from all of a sudden? Never saw that coming. I think if we plan well and we do the things that we do, that we currently do, where we have introductions to the buildings, where kids meet teachers, teachers send letters to kids, we do that as they come into K. We do that when they come up to six. Even for the eighth graders, we have shadowing day, We have days they come over. We do a lot of activities along the way to help kids transition. Those kids that we know that are going to be particularly challenged by it, we work with those families, we work with those teachers, the teachers are prepared. I'll tell you, I had three kids move in last week and I saw an email from a principal to his staff about what those teachers did to make those kids feel welcome walking in in November to a strange city, a strange school. The extent they went to to make those kids feel welcome. That's what they do. That's being a teacher.

▶ 1:46:13 Speaker 4: So I don't know what to tell you about that. And as you know, you and I have seen the same emails. We have some parents who say, I don't think it's a problem. We have other parents who say, I think it's a problem.

▶ 1:46:26 Speaker 1: And very last thing, Madam Chair, to the superintendent, people have commented that you haven't met

▶ 1:46:34 Speaker 1: with kindergarten teachers about this. I don't know if you have or haven't to date, but it's my understanding that you do have a meeting scheduled with kindergarten teachers prior to the forum. Is that right?

▶ 1:46:46 Speaker 4: Yeah. I'll tell you very honestly, I'm concerned about getting ahead of ourselves. I'm concerned, you know, it's a fine balance. If the school committee hasn't made a decision, I worry about raising people's anxiety without us having made a decision, yet it's a no-win situation.

▶ 1:47:10 Speaker 4: I mean, I can be raising anxiety for one through five teachers, because you're setting up a building with one through five, that doesn't mean we're going to stock it, or K through five, It doesn't mean we're going to man it with all new teachers. The obvious choice would be to take senior teachers or teachers with experience and say, I want to move you to this building because I need your expertise so that this building can be up and running as fast as possible. Certainly would not want to open a building, with no offense to anybody listening out there with a bunch of 24 year olds. you know so there's anxiety there as well very good thank you thank you so

▶ 1:48:06 Speaker 4: seeing no further discussion from the floor just a few comments on my end for the audience as the chair of a committee it's my job to moderate the discussion and not to weigh in until after everyone else has so that's why I've held my tongue I see this I particularly like Thomas McAndrew laid out how she in this in terms of how she viewed the challenges that we face with this and and I too see it as a cost bin and a timeline bin I'm also concerned with disruption and not just for the students or the families but also the teachers and I thank you mr. O'Connell for mentioning that I was going to bring

▶ 1:48:58 Speaker 4: that up if it hadn't or even if it had as is the case um i also have uh see this as a communication concern throughout the district and with the parents um in some ways we have tried very hard to get this out to the community and in other ways um there are always going to be parents that are not going to have heard about it until the last minute and so trying to reach all comers as best as possible is always a challenge and that's something i see that we are trying to do madam superintendent you had mentioned that we had moved the franklin times start times to compensate for those families who are dropping off at elementary schools across the district and perhaps maybe even middle schools as well on the instance that we consider a pre-k k model between the two schools the bb and the franklin i wonder if you could speak to the possibility of the family that would have to drop off a first and third grader at winthrop or hoover for instance and a kindergartener or a pre-k at bb we have those families um and uh the elementaries open

▶ 1:50:34 Speaker 4: at 803 and the b in the franklin opens at 8 37 8 30 8 30 and 8 30 and so there's a half an hour difference between the buildings kids can get come into the buildings five minutes before start time and so really kids get dropped off about five with eight at most buildings those kids that don't go to early bird and in the Franklin they can be dropped off at 825 again not including children who go to early bird we have quite a few kids who go to early bird thank you and and we have touched on tonight that you have that we have been sitting on plans for the Mowers High School with regards to expansion of further classrooms to ease class size there I don't believe we touched on the middle school in terms of easing those class sizes as we see this increased population move into the middle school can you touch on those okay so at the middle school we have We have some spaces available. We have the project rooms, and we have a couple of specialty rooms that we can use for other purposes, about five rooms. The worst case scenario that we're anticipating right now

▶ 1:52:00 Speaker 4: is having to do a split team as the bubble rolls up through the middle school. So a 6-7 team, a 7-8 team. I don't think, looking at the numbers, we would have enough for a complete extra team at each grade level. So we are anticipating possibly a split team. Don't forget the teams are running approximately 100, 110 kids on a team, and that's spread out among pretty much four to five teachers, depending on the grade level. get into the older grades you have the foreign language teachers as well calculated into that so when you look at their home rooms their home rooms are not pushing the limit so um you have

▶ 1:52:49 Speaker 4: some flexibility there with the middle school excellent and then uh just again one more time to reiterate uh the seam collaborative is actively seeking a new site right and and all of this discussion could be postponed for one may not postpone but could be pushed back a year should they not be able to find a space is that correct the work on the building could be postponed a year I wouldn't say that your decision should be postponed a year because as we talked about once your decision is made there all sorts of secondary decisions that have to be made sure very well any final

▶ 1:53:36 Speaker 4: questions from the floor thank you everyone for your robust discussion I look forward to continuing this next week at the Learning Commons at seven o'clock Learning Commons our second floor of a high school thank you everyone this concludes educational programs and personnel Thank You Mr.