NASHOBA REGIONAL SCHOOL DISTRICT
SCHOOL COMMITTEE MEETING
November 16, 2006
School Committee in Attendance: Don Adams, Ellen Sturgis, Tricia Kelly, Brian Burke, Monica CampoBasso, David Horne, Mel Govindan, Cathy Giunta, Laura O’Neil
Absent:[Marker]
Administration in Attendance: Michael Wood, Superintendent of Schools, George King, Assistant Superintendent for Finance, Sally Sullivan, Director of Teaching and Learning
CALL TO ORDER
Chair Don Adams called the meeting to order at 6:04 PM. in the Office of the Superintendent.
EXECUTIVE SESSION
MOTION
Motion moved by Ellen Sturgis to enter into Executive Session for the purpose of discussing a legal matter and to include the superintendent, assistant superintendent, attorney, Mr. Cloherty, and school committee secretary, for the purpose of discussing a pending legal matter. Seconded by Cathy Giunta. IN FAVOR: Tricia Kelly, Cathy Giunta, Don Adams, Brian Burke, Ellen Sturgis, Monica
CampoBasso, David Horne, Mel Govindan VOTED AND PASSED.< /SPAN> UNANIMOUS (8-0)
RETURN FROM EXECUTIVE SESSION
The regular meeting of the school committee resumed at 6:45 p.m.
APPROVAL OF THE WARRANTS OF NOVEMBER 3, 2006
WARRANT NO. DATE DESCRIPTION AMOUNT
2731 [Marker]11/17/06[Marker] VENDOR $ 395,539.24
2732 11/17/06 BENEFIT $ 576,194.00
2733 11/17/06 PAYROLL $ 1,054,807.70
MOTION
Cathy Giunta made a motion to approve the warrants as detailed in the memo dated 11/15/06 and noted above. Seconded by Brian Burke. IN FAVOR: Tricia Kelly, Don Adams, Brian Burke, Ellen Sturgis, Monica CampoBasso, David Horne, Mel Govindan, Cathy Giunta VOTED AND PASSED . UNANIM OUS (8-0)
APPROVAL OF THE NOVEMBER 02, 2006 MINUTES
MOTION
Ellen Sturgis made a motion to approve the minutes of November 02, 2006 as amended. Seconded by Monica CampoBasso. IN FAVOR: Tricia Kelly, Cathy Giunta, Don Adams, Brian Burke, Ellen Sturgis, Monica CampoBasso, David Horne, Mel Govindan VOTED AND PASSED. UNANIMOUS (8-0)
CORRESPONDENCE
□ Letter from Mr. Wood to parents regarding Parent Access
□ Information from the DOE regarding calculating graduation rates.
□ Parent email communication to Tricia Kelly regarding school security at the Emerson Building
□ Health Advisory flyer regarding Building Strength Within: Promoting Children’s and Adolescents’ Resilience and Emotional Well-being
□ Stow Building Task Force, Chairman’s report to Selectmen
SUPERINTENDENT’S REPORT (This report is available on the District website at www.nrsd.net)
Early Release
Mr. Wood reported to the committee that Wednesday, November 22nd is an Early Release Day.
MASC/MASS Conference
Mr. Wood reported to the committee that he was able to attend one day of the MASC/MASS Conference for school committee members and central office administrators. He said the conference was well attended by communities and school districts from across the state and Ms. Sturgis and Mr. Govindan represented the District fromour school committee. Mr. Wood reported that the focus of the conference was on connecting the future of school leadership with learning.
Building Partnerships with Higher Education
Mr. Wood told the committee that Nashoba Regional School District has a long standing commitment of working with institutions of higher learning to stay connected to the research and theory behind existing and new practice that has an impact on the classroom. He said that the District used to be home to a Professional Development Center as satellite program for Fitchburg State College andhas built a wonderful partnership with the University of Connecticut's graduate education program in recent years. Mr. Wood reported that he is presently working with Fitchburg State College on the next phase of sustaining these partnerships, which will involve an intern site for student teachers. He said that this is very much in the infancy stage and that he would keep the Nashoba community posted on this developing activity.
NCLB Requires New Calculation of Graduation Rates
Mr. Wood reported to the committee that the Department of Education (DOE) has agreed to change the way it calculates the graduation rate for all of the high schools in the Commonwealth beginning with the graduating class of 2007. he said the NCLB has a requirement that the nation agree on a methodology for calculating graduation rates and up to now Massachusetts has asked for a postponement of this provision because of a lack of data. Mr. Wood told the committee that it now has five years of "clean" data and feels it can and should comply with this requirement. He said the calculation will now include when a student enters the ninth grade, track whether the studentwas retainedor transferred and then include all students who entered that cohort of students each subsequent year and then if they graduate in four or five years.Mr. Wood
added that there are a number of categories students will be tracked in that align with the sub groups NCLB requires for national testing. He said this should make all data comparable across the country.
Mr. Wood also told the committee thatcommunities across the Commonwealth may see their graduation rate drop from what they have routinely used in previous years. He said that many communities usethe number of students whostarted in the senior year as of October 1 as compared to who actually graduated in June of that year.
SUBCOMMITTEE REPORTS
Ex-0fficio Report by Ms. O’Neil
Ms. O’Neil reported to the committee that Friday, November 17th marks the beginning of the class competitions with weather day and the annual Powder Puff football game, in which the girls play and the boys cheerlead. The schedule for related events is:
Monday: decades’ day, Tuesday: color day, Wednesday: Nashoba day. She said that each student that wears clothes for their designated area earns points for their respective classes. Ms. O’Neil also told the committee that on Tuesday, after school, students from each class will decorate a hallway to show their spirit through a chosen theme. She said that class competitions will culminate during Wednesday’s pep rally, during which the winning class will be announced.
Also reported by Ms. O’Neil:
This Week marks the beginning of a new Nashoba tradition: The Matball Tournament, to benefit the Best Buddies program. Similar to the annual volleyball tournament, teams comprised of fourteen students have been competing daily in very intense, after-school matches.
The Media Center has set up a Book Fund in honor of Mrs. Mary Hamblin who retired last spring after 23 years of service. The donations will be used for new materials for the school library.
The varsity cheerleading squad won first and fourth places at recent competitions.
Athletics:
Girls’ soccer season ended last Thursday with a tough loss against Marlboro in the district semi-finals. She said that after an intense fight, Marlboro won 4-3. Nashoba girls finished with an impressive 15-2-3 record and were the Mid-Wach B league champions.
Girls’ varsity cross country team and said they finished fifth out of twenty teams at last week’s district meet. The team finished the season with an 8-3 record for dual meets.
Boys’ varsity cross country team finished third out of twenty-four teams at the District meet, which qualified them for the state meet this Saturday in Northfield. Anthony Raduazo finished first for Nashoba, placing 9th out of 164 runners.
Varsity football team won their last two games against Doherty (40-20) and Westborough (27-0) and will play their last game of the season on Thanksgiving morning at North Middlesex Regional High School.
Facilities Subcommittee, by Ms. Kelly
Nothing to report.
Finance Subcommittee, by Ms. Giunta
Ms. Giunta reported that the Finance Subcommittee met on November 6th. She said the subcommittee looked at the long range plan. Ms. Giunta said they reviewed and discussed what projects would impact the budget, debt analysis and the budget timeline. Ms. Giunta added that there would be a full day budget meeting on a Saturday again this year, and they are looking at January 27th for that meeting date. Ms. Giunta reported that they discussed a payroll software program which Mr. King informed them of. She said this would bring the ent ire payroll process in-house and allow for easy access to reports and information.
Personnel Subcommittee, by Mr. Adams
Nothing to report.
Policy Subcommittee, by Ms. Kelly
Nothing to report.
SPED PAC, by Mr. Burke
Mr. Burke reported to the committee on the recent activity of the SPED PAC. He told the committee SPED PAC had their first meeting of the year at the Florence Sawyer School and that featured speaker were Patti Linenkemper, Director of Special Education and Tracy Conte, Asst. Director of Special Education. He said all future meetings of SPED PAC will be held in Stow at the Stone Building. He told the committee that attendance for meetings had declined since moving them to the Florence Sawyer School so the decision was made to move the meetings back to Stow. Mr. Burke said the next meeting of SPED PAC will be the third Wednesday in January in the Stone Building in Stow.
NEW BUSINESS
MCAS Presentation
A PowerPoint presentation was given by the NRSD Department of Teaching and Learning regarding MCAS. Sally Sullivan, Director of Teaching and Learning, Laura Friend, English/Language Arts Teaching & Learning Associate and Suzanne Knight, Math/Science Teaching & Learning Associate all addressed the committee and gave an overview of MCAS past, present and future. Discussion ensued and the committee asked questions about the information presented. In Ms. Knight’s presentation she noted the grade 4 math results showed growth after last year’s decline. Science and tech Ed were also discussed. Mr. Govindan told Ms. Sullivan the
district needed to make Science and Tech Ed a serious part of the curriculum rather than a “special”. Ms. CampoBasso inquired ab out when students would begin to be measured for AYP. Mr. Wood responded that currently there is a test of 10 states for this. Ms. Kelly inquired about the class of 2010 science requirements and discussion followed regarding this topic. Mr. Adams thanked Ms. Sullivan, Ms. Friend and Ms. Knight for their presentation. David Horne asked Ms. Sullivan for a listing of old curriculum and the newer curriculum she is starting to implement and how that compares to the Acton-Boxborough School District.
MASC Conference Update
Ms. Sturgis, Mr. Govindan and Mr. Wood gave brief overviews of the workshops they attended at the MASC conference in Hyannis recently. They each distributed printed material with information gathered at the conference to share with the committee. Information topics included Speaking to the Media, Massachusetts Open Meeting Law, and Data Warehouse Project Summary.
Updates on Strategic Action Steps from Administration
Mr. Wood called the committees attention to the reports from the Building Healthy Relationships Task Force, the At-Risk task Force and the Standards Based Reporting Task Force which were included in the evenings packet. He gave a brief overview of this information. Mr. Burke inquired about the flyer also included regarding the 18th Annual national At-Risk conference at Georgia Southern University, March 4-7, 2007. Ms. Kelly, Ms. Giunta, Ms. CampoBasso and Mr. Adams all voiced their support of staff attending this conference.
OLD BUSINESS
Nothing to report.
CITIZEN INPUT
Committee member Brian Burke asked to address the committee.
ADJOURNMENT
MOTION
Motion moved by Ellen Sturgis to adjourn. Seconded by Mel Govindan. IN FAVOR: Ellen Sturgis, Don Adams, Cathy Giunta OPPOSED: Brian Burke, Tricia Kelly, Monica CampoBasso, David Horne, Mel Govindan MOTION FAILED. (3-5)< /FONT>
Committee member Brian Burke thanked Mr. Wood and Mr. King for the video taping of the school committee which began with this meeting. He also inquired about sending information regarding the school committees’ decision not to provide funding to groups who approach them for funding during the fiscal year.
MOTION
Motion moved by Ellen Sturgis to adjourn. Seconded by Monica CampoBasso. IN FAVOR: Tricia Kelly, Cathy Giunta, Don Adams, Brian Burke, Ellen Sturgis, Monica CampoBasso, David Horne, Mel Govindan VOTED AND PASSED. UNANIMOUS (8-0)
The meeting adjourned at 8:58 p.m.
Respectfully Submitted,
Linda DeStasi
Executive Assistant
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