School Choice Vote (10 minutes) vote required

Transcript (~3 min @ 54:00)

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▶ 54:10 Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr. O'Connell.

▶ 54:12 Margaret Raymond Driscoll: next in our agenda is the school choice vote as you know this earlier in our meeting we held a public hearing regarding school choice which is our obligation under the law and at this time I would invite invite the committee to consider the packet documents before you it is a memo from the superintendent with respect to school choice I would invite her to speak to that well please

▶ 54:40 Speaker 6: thank you miss Driscoll this year I am recommending that the Melrose public schools does not I repeat not participate for in school choice for the 2018-2019 school year fiscal year 2019 I think we are all aware of our rising enrollment the strain on the on the teacher to student ratio this year we patch together some solutions at the secondary level hired four people at the elementary level and we will need additional staffing again next year that

▶ 55:21 Speaker 6: number remains to be determined registration will take place in February if we get to February vacation and I have 300 kids pre-registered I think we can probably safely predict another 15 K's but the high school I'm looking at my November 1 numbers the high school on November 1 was at a thousand six students obviously they're feeling we had a great number of students return or transfer in they're feeling that impact and while the middle school is at a low point that low point will begin to reverse itself next year because the incoming fifth grade for next year is predicted to be 282 so their numbers will begin to rise as well so I don't think we have the space please remember under school choice law students who are currently enrolled with us have the right to stay with us until they graduate thank you so for purposes of

▶ 56:21 Margaret Raymond Driscoll: discussion I would entertain a motion to not participate in school choice for school year 18 second 19 made by mr. O'Connell seconded by miss McAllister grand discussion on that motion seeing none all in favor opposed that motion carries unanimously next on our agenda is data presentations as you may recall from last year's document in 2015 we had a substantive discussion on the kinds of reporting that we would expect from the administration in order to do the business that we needed to do this was intended to accomplish two things one it was intended to allow the committee to share with the superintendent basically a year in advance the kinds of data and information that we would expect on our agendas to support the votes that we need to take and the discussion we would have secondly it it is designed to keep us within our roles and responsibilities so the data is aligned with the work that we do and it allows the administration to stay aligned with the work that they are responsible for doing so this 2016 was the second year and that is the date that is referenced at the top of this memo and we are now in the third year you can see that the document is extremely similar the only change proposed is the addition of the maintenance report which is something that we have been getting I think it was an omission in the past so that's in effect not a substantive change it is more a correction so that is this is an item that does require a vote so I would invite the a motion by the committee motion to accept the memo as written the