comments from community members yes so you want to tell us who you are tell us your name my name is peter duval my daughter laura is a fifth grader at browns river mmhmm and my concern is about water at the beginning of the year she started buying her lunch mmhmm and the choice is milk or a dinky little bottle of water for beverage recently i learned that the dinky little bottle of water will no longer be available and so now only milk is offered at lunch even though the price has stayed the same kids that don't drink the milk they have nothing to drink and they have to wait until you know they go to the water fountain i know or maybe they have juice or stop on the way in it's more likely that they go out of the room and then come back yeah after drinking water i've already gone through the proper channels in the school here and i haven't really gotten a satisfactory answer about why the school can't provide water to all kids at lunch time mmhmm you know it would be a simple matter of providing enough water in bottles perhaps a survey on why there's no explanation given on the essential need for water or do like the other schools that i've seen in terms of water and cups mmhmm and if you're thirsty you go to the table and you pour yourself a cup of water and you have it with your meal so my question is why can't that happen at browns river middle school saves money cuts waste reasonable gets water to all the kids who are thirsty including the kids who are bringing lunch from home mmhmm okay since i'm here i can follow up with it okay it certainly seems like a mmhmm not an unusual or unreasonable request hmm perhaps i'll follow up with kevin see if i can get to the bottom of that okay thank you henry then will you get back to mr vale duval yeah i'm peter duval i'm sorry okay yeah i can get back to him okay so john will check that out for you and you'll hear from him great i hope that can happen quickly because mmhmm of course the summer's coming water is an essential thing for the human body but also it's getting warmer mmhmm since they're outside more they're gonna need to drink more water can i ask a question yes so if there were a bunch of cups available in the cafeteria that would be okay just drinking cups well they would need cups and they need pitchers full of water or you know maybe a cooler because there's no tap or water fountain in the dining room okay so john will get back we'll get back in touch with you thanks sorry one more thing could they refill their own water bottles from those pitchers would that be all right too i'd be fine with that but they need to have the they need the water access to the water right okay there to do it yeah but they do need to have the cups because not everybody has water bottles other comments from community members yes just wondering what that configuration difference would be then between camel's hump and browns river because last time i was at camel's hump in the cafeteria there's a water fountain literally with the you know shape of the water bottle and you can fill a water bottle at the water fountain mmhmm so i'm just wondering if the configuration is different i don't know how it actually i don't know if they have one of those automatic water dispensers they're trying to raise money come to the classes here to purchase one of those it's already been purchased for here just hasn't been installed yet okay for the cafeteria yeah for here so i'm sure probably but it will be installed in the cafeteria there's one that's gonna go near the cafeteria yeah near or yeah i don't have the exact spot the only thing is yeah if the kids are not allowed to leave the cafeteria right and it's not in the cafeteria it becomes a catch twenty two well the one in at camel's hump is opposite it's in the cafeteria from the lunch line so it's in the cafeteria i'll follow up okay that's why i asked on the configuration there's waterline there it allows that installation so i was just wondering if that was the case at browns river i believe there is a water fountain in there that's what they hooked them up to hello we were just discussing water availability for students in the cafeteria at browns river if you have something that you'd like to discuss we'd be happy to hear it and we're hear to listen yeah you are okay we're going to change the agenda a little bit because linda has graciously offered to house some of the music students and has to go and pick them up so we're going to move to item three of the discussion on the inside security cameras installation at mount mansfield mike do you have information or do you this actually comes as a seconded motion from the facilities committee after discussing at our committee meeting getting the feedback that we had asked for and that we are as a seconded motion bringing forward the ability of the high school to reinstall the cameras that they have there would be eight cameras placed in the common hallways and there's no additional costs except for installation because the machinery and the equipment is already paid for okay questions for the facilities committee what were the cameras used for before they were installed then there was objections enough people objecting to it at the time that they were removed from the interior areas but they were still kept in the exterior to help cut down on vandalism with the buses and what's changed and when were they removed about two months after they were installed just removed a year ago two years seven years ago seven years ago seven years old so we're gonna put in seven year old cameras that still work mmhmm that's the plan mmhmm yep okay could we have a motion as this comes as a seconded yeah this comes seconded this is a seconded motion but we need a motion to vote on okay if it comes as a seconded emotion i don't think we need we don't have to have any approval no we can just discuss and then vote on it yes we have to vote on it oh i just asked if there was more discussion and no one said anything oh okay sorry cliff yeah it's been seven years in that seven years how many occasions have there been when having those security cameras there might have been useful i'm not sure you know because without them we have to use other methods to try to figure things out you know we've talked to kids there certainly would be some you know with some of the vandalism a handful mmhmm i've got more thank you these would be installed only in the main corridor yes main corridors and lobbies so the notion that first responders can see whether some distant wing is clear or not doesn't apply yes it does it does because every main so it every main they would point down it would be pointed down the wings okay right so you know each wing would be yeah sort of covered by a camera we have some small lobbies in different parts of the building yeah according to the free press that's a footnote according to the free press this morning cvu doesn't have any of these and they seem to have survived what's different about mmu this was something that came out of the you know the january 3rd facilities committee we talked about it at that facilities committee meeting this is a tool that for me if the worst thing possible happened this is something that allows us to deal with that situation better daytoday stuff i mean i'm gonna knock on wood we have great kids i don't have you know many times to go back to the tape to see who started the fight cause we don't have many fights but for me if that worst thing happened this helps well in law enforcement as well sarah you've talked to the state police and it could be a local police that it could be a useful tool you know richmond elementary has the capacity now it's in common areas where because it's webbased the police can see certain spots of the building so if there was a threat and they knew where it was then they can go directly to try to eliminate the threat yeah which goes to my question we only had cameras in for two months in the history of the school as to what you know how many instances have there been when you would have needed things you know i can think of one that was it was a harassment case where there were two very different stories it was in one of the corridors and i think it probably would have helped us find the truth in that particular situation mmhmm i mean that's just one that i know of and i'm you know working at a central office cause we did do a pretty indepth investigation of it dave yeah john and i had a discussion about this and in one case where the cameras were installed in the buses and there was an allegation made mmhmm that students had been you know shaken or touched on a bus with the camera it was shown that the bus driver went back and talked to the students at no point did he touch either student and so you know it helped to find the facts i mean i don't have any objection to these cameras being turned on as long as the review of what they're recording only occurs in an emergency or for using to then ferret out what the truth of the matter is i don't want it to be surveillance but i don't have an issue with it as being an arbiter as to you know what really happened yes would these be on when school is out of session i'm thinking of the hardware fixing it my only experience with cameras is really what happened seven years ago i became a little bit of an expert for that there the experts with cameras say that once they're on they're always on oh so you never turn them off they're sort of selftaping over so that's a good example chip what came to mind we didn't even really know about that was the incident that happened at harwood union i've gotta think that if there were cameras that would've help in finding out exactly what happened there's extensive amount of damage not to mention the impact on the educational program yes i have a few questions i don't know who it's directed to but who has access to the video how long is the video stored and is it streamed online access to the video is principal in designate stored it's just an estimate it's around twenty days and it automatically deletes it automatically tapes sort of it's digital but it deletes or records over itself it's not streamed online but it can be accessed through the internet by you or your designate correct by anyone who's got anyone with the password the password could essentially would break into it would live with the two of us and i assume the state police we would give you know the state police that as well yes go ahead and i can speak from the student perspective we've given the student body multiple opportunities to voice their opinions on the installation of cameras and there has not been any organized opposal and the reason was it was presented somewhat shortly after new town and they understood that there unfortunately there might be a need and then kind of the consensus was we don't have an issue with it and let's put them in and hope we never have to use them and there hasn't been any from either cougar house and maybe mr weston can say that through lunch with the administrators the only thing is there's been questions about where would they go when would they be used how long just similar questions that the board has been asked thank you further questions comments if not we have the motion but we need to vote so those in favor of the motion presented by the facilities committee indicate by saying aye aye those opposed abstained thank you very much so we will go back to item number two graduation credits in computer applications can i just and on the agenda it says graduation credits it's really graduation requirement we're not looking at adjusting the credits we're looking at the requirements so we're not saying we want one less credit or two less credits it's just right now it is a requirement of graduation thank you okay the curriculum committee discussed it looked at it and may have a position on that we have a position we have a seconded motion also we had a presentation a week ago from eric hall who is a technology integration specialist at mmu and he basically walked us through the educational process for technology basically k through twelve mike weston eric and jen basojourns brought to our attention that this requirement is really no longer relevant the middle schools no longer tests for these skills and the elements of this requirement are embedded all throughout the elementary and middle school academics so as we move toward each student having their own computer the technology skills are gonna be used throughout the entire curriculum so do you want me to read the seconded motion that we came up with yes please yes please okay the information technology graduation requirement will be sunsetted effective two thousand and seventeen the skills in this class are currently being embedded in the k through eight curriculum that's fine does that sound right yeah mmhmm diane why two thousand and seventeen why not earlier because those kids have already met the requirement those student have showed yeah whenever the students came into the high school they're given their they tested out of it a piece of paper they're given this is what you got for the path to graduate uhhuh to adjust that on them one way or the other does not seem like the right thing to there are very few students we're talking about we're gonna offer the course one more time and we won't have to offer it again oh so my follow up question is because many of the students sort of tested out of it and did not require it yes perfect thank you cliff i have the same question why two thousand and seventeen why not next week it'll free up some students calendars so they could do physics instead of which is a great class by the way sorry it's a great class by the way right yeah well as opposed to angry birds i'm not sharp students who already have a pass on the transcript cause they have missed they don't have to take it school or whatever but isn't there's just some way we can get rid of this requirement and grandfather them in they still get credit for it yeah it's not taken away there are roughly fifteen students fifteen to eighteen students who did not pass it when the middle school was assessing and are with us now mmhmm and if you all wanna change this i'm fine with that but going by the spirit of the graduation requirements put forth in policy was that students need to demonstrate so these students are not these are students who don't have aren't part of the onetoone initiative they're students who the presentation that was given to the curriculum committee dealt with that group of students who have you know who were getting the onetoone having a different education in middle school than some of these other students that's why we didn't push for it to be immediately but if that's what folks wanna do i'm sure those fifteen kids would mm gladly take another course yeah or take computer apps as an elective right conner now i understand why the current freshmen grid would have to keep that requirement but why couldn't we introduce the new policy to the upcoming freshmen grade yes that's what we're talking about we are yeah okay by two thousand and seventeen the graduation year sunsetted in oh okay i thought you meant that was starting next year the start of like they won't need to do it okay thank you it's a requirement yeah michael mmhmm is this currently embedded in all of our standing elementary schools curriculum as it is now yes that what we've been doing whoever's there now yes so each one of those are embedded yeah in the curriculum thank you in the school all clear i've forgotten the parliamentary procedure for offering a friendly amendment just say i want to offer a friendly amendment that's all you gotta do if that's all you gotta do then that he's done that a lot motion takes precedence over the other motions i'm guessing that will be yes well until the pending motion gets decided i'm not quite sure how i wanna word this but i would like to see this requirement removed as a graduation requirement effective at the close of the twenty million one hundred and twenty two thousand and thirteen year but that the course be offered as an elective in the two hundred and one thousand three hundred and fourteen year yeah and i think that i don't know if it's gonna disappear as an elective or not we haven't discussed that or offer it as an elective starting in that year i don't care when it turns well it can always be an elective yeah right yeah that's really a substitute motion but you know just do what you want with it there are two issues there it's your prerogative you raised two issues one is the sunset date and the other was yeah an elective issue yeah the elective issue so maybe we should focus that can be followed just on the date sorry maybe we should focus just on the date yeah let's forget what i said about the elective does that fall away so now it is a friendly amendment because it's gonna be eased yes so we're no longer assessing these skills right we're no longer assessing to ensure that our students are meeting these requirements we are yeah we just we are assessing so the way it is the way it has been sort of prior to the onetoone was mmhmm students were taking a course in middle school that focused on these information technology skills if they didn't pass this course or they weren't part of our middle schools they had to take the basic computer applications course with us that focused on these skills with the onetoone rollout this year to make sure the students knew the skills when they needed them we didn't have to wait we put it into teaching you know in english class they talk about folders in history maybe they would look at powerpoint presentations in science they would look at spreadsheets it became part of the instruction of the material so it's not being directly assessed as sort of a hangalone grade but you can't complete the assignment unless you can do it and it's part of the rubrics right exactly and we're doing that really grade two through grade twelve because it seems that kids apply the skills better when they're in context and we've already made the port where that's gonna continue next year you know we're having some inservice time in june for all 9th and 10th grade teachers to continue this and we'll continue to roll it out as the onetoone marches its way forward so not assessing by that yeah it means we're not having a letter grade on the report card to speak directly to the course any questions yeah go ahead i'm just confused about procedure someone who at browns river learnt about sketchup and photoshop and all that good stuff yeah has been keyboarding since 1st grade or something or other does that actually show up on the transcript cause i know if you'd take french i in 8th grade that shows up on the transcript so it doesn't show up into your grade it shows up as requirement met well just as a p yeah or something yeah yeah mmhmm requirement met right in middle school or something i'm not sure that's happened at least it does on the computer system so we know they've met it it's there cause yeah we review you know they have met it yeah okay no as long as the committee other discussions does not object okay if not we did no one mandate do we have to second this friendly amendment we do have to have a second on the friendly amendment and what year are we changing it to two thousand and thirteen yeah yes the two hundred and one thousand two hundred and thirteen school year well is there a second i'll second we're looking for a second he said it is that an issue john we have two so it kind of is right it's seconded so if it's seconded then i would wanna say something can i yeah go ahead end this discussion now yeah exactly can we end it can i my one concern with this is once it's no longer required some students who may benefit from taking that course will choose not to take it i have fifteen students i'm pretty sure would really benefit from this course next year i am worried probably not losing all of them but losing five of them because when they find out that they don't have to take it they won't they won't so i understand the point i get it but sometimes with fifteen sixteen seventeen year old students it's written down you have to do it works better than it's good for you but yeah diane whatever y'all wanna do yeah my observation after we discussed the two thousand and seventeen and then i was listening to what mike was saying i understand completely mmhmm and i quite agree with that that you know we could be losing some students who really didn't get what they were supposed to in middle school and that would be important and i'm glad to see that it's only about fifteen students having had a student that was in ap classes and was told in senior year never passed the keyboarding exam and had to take that i'm glad that it's going away for the kids who really need it to go away but there are plenty of kids probably you're absolutely right so supporting that dave yeah i would speak against the amendment for the reasons that mike has made sometimes called mark old what's his name yes tyrone is there something is there something that's changing like next year in the integration with the middle schools so next year we won't have fifteen students that would benefit from this course yes what the middle school is doing is changing it okay the middle and elementary has changed over the last couple years okay mmhmm to address this cliff that's a good point these fifteen or sixteen students are they all seniors in which case there's a lot of them but next year's seniors i'm already up i'm already two next year okay we have this year's diplomas great we're due next year's that's it their end credits are weighted right yeah so the middle schools are moving away from these standalone classes where they're teaching some of these skills and what we've done is we've embedded them into rubrics that are actually happening in math and social studies and science and language arts so just to go back to the date two thousand and seventeen is the incoming freshmen right right so we're including but you're saying they will have already met this two thousand and seventeen yeah they will have it would be the first class that it doesn't apply for that it does not apply to so it'll end in two thousand and sixteen uhhuh i am happy if you wanna change it just one just give me one more year with it i can get everything i need done but we did that to be i thought consistent to students when they came in that piece of paper that was given them that graduation plan they've been working on would be consistent so but it's your choice but what mike's saying is really one year if you wanna change it you know you'd wanna sunset it in move it to fourteen like in fifteen yeah at the end of at the end of one thousand three hundred and fourteen between thirteen and fourteen okay we have the friendly amendment seconded hmp and we do need to vote on that unless there's more discussion so those in favor of the amendment as read indicate by saying aye can we review the amendment what the original one no the the friendly amendment should i amend my friendly amendment this is just the amendment changed the date sydney unless you wanna unless he wants me to amend the amendment do you want me to read it go ahead please you want chris to read it yeah that would help us if i read it okay all right the information technology graduation requirement will be sunsetted effective twenty million one hundred and twenty two thousand and thirteen school year the skills in this class are currently being embedded in the k through eight curriculum okay amended version those in favor yes cliff just one more point of discussion how do i withdraw a friendly amendment you just say i wish to withdraw and the second but it's been seconded i'm not sure then the person who seconded it also has to withdraw their second okay i'm happy to withdraw my friendly amendment good mike was it you or no i did not okay i will agree with that withdrawal okay now we're back to the original seconded amendment which indicates two thousand and seventeen yeah this will sunset in two thousand and seventeen is there more discussion about that okay i see none those in favor of the seconded amendment can't wait to get through this item brought to us from the curriculum committee please indicate by saying aye aye those opposed those abstaining thank you sydney awesome thank you everybody you're next okay okay and we are eliminating number four the approval of the interim tax fees as those are still awaiting definition yep i'll bring it in june okay conner and hailey you're up do you want me to go ladies first oh okay ever the gentleman so we have the all state music festival so we have like four hundred extra kids in our school which is cool and i actually went to mmu first thinking it was there and there was just like so many kids outside i was like it's probably not here then they came here and i was like oh look at that but yeah we have prom coming up on the 18th i was looking for a cover it's pretty sweet me and conner uhhuh yeah we have a ton of senior stuff that's coming up but those don't really apply to everyone so there's no issue about that do you have anything else to add the senior play production is oh that's going on the opening date i know it's late may but mr weston do you know the opening night date i wanna say it's june uhhuh but i could be wrong it's that friday i think it's the 31st and 1st so 31st and 1st so it's friday and saturday that's right what's the name of it let's see i think it's just called the senior play no it's are you sure no it's it totally has a name it's i don't know it's something that's gonna bother me it's not on the website bring out your date an option nobody knows i'll email you i don't know what the correct name is i walk by the sign every darn day yeah that's the way it is it involves a magnifying glass yeah it's probably a mystery it is of some sort yeah uhhuh i'm on the website too there's nothing on the site and i'm not finding it under drama stephanie was there last night and she couldn't find it i thought i had an in with and then you could call her i'll read the sign when i go pick up my students conner you got more than that our dance team just had a carwash that was extremely successful i believe i heard it was two hundred and ten two hundred and ten yeah which i think is pretty good yeah for a day carwash yeah the spring sports are now in full swing and now even some sports are looking towards playoffs or state meets or state matches i'm not sure with tennis is it state match i think so uhhuh and i believe that's it great judy yes yeah i just wanted to say for those of you that weren't aware last thursday john mike myself and hailey and conner were speaking with molly walsh in regards to the camera issue but i want everyone to realize what amazing student reps we have they were articulate they were clear they answered the questions without hemming and hawing and you both deserve a lot of credit for doing it so thank you yay thank you very much good job and this is haley's last meeting i'm assuming she's not gonna come on the 13th since that's senior banquet night yeah she's been doing this for two years so thanks a lot hailey you're welcome thank you yeah thanks thank you hailey i'm not sure if this would be conner's last or not but conner could you fill them in on i was gonna wait for other business but sure last this is exciting yeah i was recently just accepted to the united world college program the campus that i was offered is in duino italy it's about seventy miles northeast of venice nice in late august i will be leaving for two years to be getting an ib diploma which credits can be transferred to colleges and some cannot i might just be a very old freshmen but i think the two years in italy will be worth it yes but thank you so much for everyone on the board for the experience to help serve with you it's been really fun and through the people who i hear who are applying for my position i'm leaving you in good hands thank you congratulations no matter who is selected it certainly is that's really cool congratulations that's great well done man distinguishing honor i'm trying to start to learn italian that's good yeah could i just request conner would you tell this board a little bit about united world college sure it is a program that is trying to the idea is bring everyone from around the world together that are leaders and give them an academic atmosphere to really further develop it's very large into diplomacy a lot of graduates do go to work in untype fields there are programs or campuses from all over the world the american campus is in new mexico we've had two students in the last two or three years two years who have been accepted to the new mexico campus mmhmm so mmu has a very strong reputation for the program they accept fifty americans twenty five of which go to new mexico and the other twenty five are kind of dispersed around the world it follows the ib curriculum the way it works is you hyperfocus in three subjects and then you kind of like minor in three and then you have a fun one i'm thinking about majoring in and it's kind of like majoring advanced math physics and to be determined not a hundred percent sure yet and trying to learn italian it's rough i can't roll r's it's a challenging exercise good kid the honorary president is it's just kinda like an honor but it's nelson mandela and i believe the prince of wales so it's that's a good combo it's a very prestigious institution and program and i know that i will be coming back on some breaks and i'm hoping to try to organize a way that i can give kind of a pitch to the student body i haven't talked to mr weston about that but it's a great program and i think that a lot of people should hear about it because i kind of heard about it through fluke so uhhuh thank you but when you do come back that's great we would like to invite you to come and tell us about it too yeah your experiences cause certainly i was just about to say i would love to i agree thank you is it funded again congratulations yes i'm a davis scholarship recipient that's tough competition so tuition room and board and basic living expenses are paid for that's great wow that's really cool that's amazing wow mike did you have anything else no i you needed to bring up who here has watched the all state concert i actually realized for those who don't know the all state festival is at mmu right now they started yesterday and they proceed through saturday tonight is a scholarship concert tomorrow night seven o'clock is the jazz concert saturday afternoon two o'clock is the orchestra concert the band and orchestra and then four hundred and thirty on saturday is the choral concert it's outstanding i spent time walking around listening the folks directing are all i'm not sure about the jazz the gentleman directing the jazz group but all the others are from colleges delaware one of the big ten schools i've suddenly blanked on it and then a school in virginia it's really it's quite impressive so if you get a chance even if you get a chance tomorrow just stop by and i'll walk you around and you can just sit in and listen to some there's not much on the website about it it doesn't have times yeah they don't give us much oh they wanna run it through their website oh okay yeah they're kind of protective and also mike how many mmu students are nineteen participating nineteen yeah and how are they distributed two in jazz and then i think we had now is that relevant we had eight eight and eight or eight and whatever's left we have eight orchestra so that would be nine choral high schools thank you so much john so i wanted to i wasn't sure i was at a special vote in bolton at our last meeting so i wasn't able to attend but we have the committee assignments i'm passing those around there's a conflict with the next one with strategic planning and finance there's some members that are on both committees i'm gonna talk with chip and see if we can't get the strategic planning meeting moved the finance committee has been scheduled for that for you know almost a year or so we'll work that out so we don't have any overlap but i'll pass these out question yes we talked about having facilities in may as well is that that may be gonna create more conflicts oh i'm just counting the different well let's check it's not on the schedule not originally we may have to do it on a different night okay hmm but i'll look a revision oh just looking here we'll schedule one for may okay then appreciate it yeah i'll do that oh great so can i get it from you during the day so i'm trying to limit the paper but i do have the well i'll start with something else here i don't wanna get ahead of myself i want everybody to pay close attention okay so merger school district merger options sorry set up isn't ideal but good shot it's the only game in town it was about two years ago when we had a vote to ask the electorate whether or not they wanted to form a regional education district or a red that did not pass here is what the vote count is it did pass in four of the six towns it did not pass in huntington and it did not pass in richmond and recently i'd say over the last couple of months really after the budget process there's been some interest from our elementary boards in looking at what the options are and discussing within boards whether or not they want to look at one of those merger options school district merger options so we met about a month ago with all of the elementary boards and i showed them most of the slides that i'm gonna be presenting to you tonight we also brought it to the executive committee and the executive committee really asked boards if they would talk about it in their local boards to see if they were interested in pursuing some sort of a merger so i haven't tallied where we are with all of the boards there is at least one board that has a lot questions and there are probably about three others that i know of that are interested in looking at least conceptually a school district merger and we had a good discussion folks asked a lot of questions i've had a relay communication with vaughn altemas at the agency of education and asked some questions about the merger legislation and tonight the purpose of this is to get some directions from the mmu board and i think for judy and diane as to whether or not the mmu board can support a school district merger it's obviously a very important component of the su and two thirds of the entire su i'm not sure exactly what would happen if mmu said yeah no and all the other school districts or at least the majority of them said we wanna merge i think we'd have to cross that bridge when we come to it but i think we'd like to get some direction or some information from the board whether or not they could support school district merger of some of our elementary districts is that really an option that this board has seen as we aren't a voting unit i believe technically i don't believe so technically i think if the majority of the districts wanted an option especially one of them mmhmm that pertains to mmu that's the one i think we'd wanna know hear what the thoughts are of the board technically i don't believe that they could stop a merger if they had more standing if a majority of the elementary boards wanted to but we definitely wanna know what folks think so i just wanna clarify that i guess i wasn't aware of that so you mean you said our board isn't a voting unit well it's not a voting unit in terms of budgets we're a unified you're a union school district a union school district you're not a municipality we aren't a municipality okay and the voting it's not like we're voting on a mount mansfield or a chittenden east budget the voting would be done town by town by town okay hmm i guess i never actually gave that any thought it sounds like it really is the case that all the elementary school boards would really merge with this board rather than specifically rather than just all the boards merging there some other there's options there some other options in here so it's almost unidirectional in a way yes but there are some other options in here okay but one of them is the and this is a mouthful i've heard somebody call it mud it's the modified unified union school district but that one it really does and would impact this board and would impact this union so i'm gonna share the details as i know them and as i've learned about them over the last two years and then hopefully we can have a discussion and see what the thoughts are of folks on this board so in the two thousand and twelve session the legislature expanded some of the options and the incentives for voluntary school district mergers not necessarily rads which is the region educational district which is what we voted on two years ago but some other options and some joint agreements or mergers of services i'm gonna be referring to really act one hundred and fifty six tonight and it offers some supports for supervisory union mergers and some joint agreements between two or more school districts for example if you had two small districts that were running their own transportation system they might be able to enter into a joint agreement and run their transportation systems together or facilities management or some shared staffing or actually even enter into an agreement to run a school mm interesting so one of the new options is a union elementary district this is if a majority of elementary school districts that belong to the same union school district the term is really high school ours is fifty eight so it's middlehigh our district does pertain to this legislation i did check that out if they want to form a union elementary district they can merge voluntarily they're eligible for study reimbursements incentives and a transitional grant each of the school districts that would wanna merge must vote to approve the union elementary district if this is something a school district wants to do for example if four of our elementary districts wanted to merge they could but each one of the districts the town would have to approve it so this is one of the options there's another option as well this really allows for elementary districts that feed into the same union high school to merge as an elementary district if they want to and districts that don't they don't have to so i sent all this as a pdf to folks mmhmm is it time to ask questions or do we wait till the end you can ask as we go along it probably will be helpful cause the information is dense it's very dense you know yeah there's a lot to it so if for example four of our elementary schools wanted to merge would that be merging into one elementary district so we would have three elementary and one middlehigh is that how that would work well potentially you could have say four elementary districts in chittenden east that merged mmhmm that would be one district mmhmm and then you would have two those are individual that didn't they were standalone independent school districts and then we would have the unions the mount mansfield union school district which would be five to eight okay mm in that situation would the merged elementary school district be part of this board no no they would have their own board and they would have to follow a lot of the statutory steps or almost all of them that we did in the red so you have to be in articles of agreement they'd have to decide on what the configuration of the board was like they'd have to be really based on the electorate portion of the electorate then union school district merger this is any merger of two or more school districts they're eligible for some of the red incentives as well consultation reimbursement the transitional grant or five of the base set amount really multiplied by the students in both of the districts up to a max of one hundred and fifty thousand whichever is last it can't go over one hundred and fifty thousand but none of the tax incentives so the declining tax incentives the union school district merger are not eligible for those and this merger again if you had two school districts or three that wanted to pursue this the towns that wanted to do it or bringing it to the electorate it would have to pass in all of those towns for it to happen so if two voted yes and one voted no it doesn't happen hmm john yes is this the one where they could combine also with the mount mansfield union high school district no that's another one okay great next page yeah there are a number of options what's important to i think understand is there are so many different school districts in the state of vermont i guess for some the thinking was a menu might work for more people so does this mean that all of the people that participate in this all the districts that participate in this vote would have to say that they wanna be merged or else it doesn't happen that's correct yeah okay that's what he said now for the modified union school district i've heard it called mud i'm not gonna use that term in passing well somebody called it mud to me today this is if all the towns that belong to a union high school district vote to form a modified unified union school district and the merger is approved by the majority of the towns but not all i'm gonna call it a musd i don't like the muusd hmp a musd is formed it becomes the prek district for the towns that vote to approve it and it operates the union schools it can earn voluntary merger reimburse all the incentives that were a red apply to this merger as well the towns that vote against msusd still participate in the union still have representation on the board still send their they're either nine hundred and twelve or five hundred and twelve students to the union district however they maintain their own independent school boards this allows for the creation of something that would look like a red a prek to 12th district but also allows the districts that don't want to participate to hold their independent boards and still maintain their assets in the union school district and representation on the board so if this had been available two years ago the outcome would have been a red except for richmond and huntington which would have had their own boards in the school that's correct yes but those towns don't get the tax incentives they don't they won't get the tax incentives they will get some benefit just because it will influence the tax rate a bit for them so they will get some benefit even by the school tax even by holding their independent or maintaining their independent school district by the reading it says if all the towns that belong to the district vote this is gonna maybe sound like a very ignorant question but what is the mechanism that that vote to the elementary boards initiate the vote in that town yes yeah if one elementary school board decided that they did not wanna participate and hold a vote then this could not even happen no i asked okay that question today to vaughn all right if you had a majority of the boards of one of them that want to put together a committee mm and start the statutory process the districts that don't want to they don't have to participate in the committee but the vote still has to happen in the towns okay which sounds fair reading that it's really not what that says you know but i don't know so it's if all the towns that belong to the district vote well they all have to vote so that was my question couldn't it be that one town just decides not to hold a vote nope not if a majority of the school districts want to pursue this the majority i see but you just said that forces the vote for the other towns is what you're saying yes that's correct huh okay mmmm so that would put it back into the other category of the union elementary district like maybe i'm not something along those lines maybe i'm misunderstanding what you're asking okay if we have four of our elementary boards that wanted to pursue this mmhmm two boards can't say we're not gonna hold the vote in the town it has to be voted on in every town so you couldn't have one town that said no we're not gonna hold the vote okay okay i mean all right we can talk about it later but they can still vote no yeah they can vote no which would put them into the category of independent boards right no no no i think it's fair i'm just wondering the political process where a bunch of towns can force a vote in another town altogether that that's what happens that's my understanding yeah okay i mean i asked no i believe you yeah mean i asked i'm just asking this specific question today i asked what if one town says no right no we're not doing this huh okay and they said the answer i got was they can okay conversely simple as that the town that doesn't vote that decision is made by five people well i mean i think probably people might just for the vote still come out and vote yeah no seriously i mean mmhmm if richmond decides they don't want to participate that decision is made by five people for the town to not participate in a vote hmm i just kind of find that interesting well that's their job that we talk about it as yeah that's the way it works we do that all the time expressing the town's wish i just find it interesting that's all but wait a minute i thought yeah you said they all have to vote they have to vote no no i meant in the ones where you had an option you're trying to create a majority or a yeah of not right right and i just think it's they don't have to participate in the committee or they can right but if a majority of the elementary districts wanted to pursue this then one town can say we're not gonna hold a vote other questions yes john has the law including the modified union district as it was passed by the legislature last spring has that undergone any technical correction i'm not aware of any no well if that's the case then people might ought to know that on page two thousand two hundred and thirty nine of the journal of the senate of may 5th two thousand and twelve it says that establishment of a modified union school district shall one dissolve the union high school district and any assets or liabilities held by the union high school districts shall be transferred to the modified union district and two dissolve the elementary school districts that voted in favor of establishing the unified union district and any assets or liabilities they held as individuals districts shall be transferred to the modified union school district in other words if you vote as a town not to participate in this you'll lose your assets in the high school we used to call that stealing no they're still represented on that's not what it says here well then there's gonna have to be some guidance legally around when i asked the question okay the independent districts that are part of the union do they hold the assets that they hold you know hold in five hundred and twelve they said yes okay because they're represented it says it right up there if you vote no the towns that vote against the musd still participate in the musd by sending children to these new schools and are represented on the school board so they'll be represented on the board the new board that holds all the assets it doesn't say that in the law no if the town votes against it they wanna remain independent right their high school assets get transferred to the union board which they sit on they would be sitting members on that board as well which is what it says right here then they still hold the assets in the same way it's taken them yeah yeah yeah that they do right currently right but they wouldn't we'd have to separate what those assets are we do now and so there would have to be a separation between the five hundred and twelve and the prek to twelve john yes doesn't that create that that new board an unequal representation because the towns that choose not to join in actuality would probably have greater representation i mean you take a town that currently has two members on this board they would still continue to have members mmhmm but in the new board a town may only have one member that may be of equal size so isn't it possible then that the representation becomes disparate as a result mmhmm that's up to the committee that's putting it all together to iron that out how many members and all of that it's possible anything's possible until all that's designated and figured out uhhuh yeah but i mean if you're gonna say they maintain their representation then i'm presuming they're maintaining their current purpose yeah i think that but it's a new board hmm that's gonna happen i think the board this is my understanding it's different than a red that the board would remain as it is this board potentially would expand its role to prek to twelve for some schools the representation would stay the same there would have to obviously be some procedural structural requirements around what's voted on and what isn't i mean because here's an example so this is where i think it could get complicated you could yeah that's what we think it has this is what we've come to bye lindi here's it now say that underhill center hypothetically we merged into a district and they wanted to start a public preschool it wouldn't be fair for necessarily huntington to be voting on that so there would have to be some procedural pieces that are put in place so that if it was something that pertained solely to prek to four i don't wanna pick on huntington but bolton they couldn't vote on it if they had their own independent district oh okay yeah i don't wanna divert you but i do wanna comment on your example because i think it's something we should all think hard about part of the reason that i think we ought to be thinking very hard about organizing a single school district that is responsible for all our children and all our tax dollars throughout the communities that are now part of mount mansfield school district is that we all have an equal stake in that education of kids from prek through twelve being successful now the way you phrased your examples you said that town that is out doesn't really have a stake in that particular decision the reality is one of the things that frustrates me about current organizational structure is we in this board are not talking about and never talking about the prek through grade four issues that at some point are going to impact mm the success of our students whether or not my community has voted for some form of unified school district i still believe that my real community which is the mount mansfield school district because we really are a community dedicated to educating all of our children together and managing all of our tax dollars together has that same stake in that decision because ultimately it doesn't end when the child leaves 4th grade it continues throughout their educational career and i think my greatest frustration with our organizational structure right now is we don't sit down as a community and talk about these issues with prek to twelve and that's really what would be my goal if we pursue this because i think that we're missing a lot of opportunities to improve how we think about educating our students and also to be efficient at it as well yes you're looking to me yes to your point one of the issues i see is the fact that unless you have all the elementary school boards involved in the district all the towns belong to one district or red whatever you wanna call it musd then you lose the ability which i think is one of the big points about this as having a consistent curriculum through all of the elementary schools so that when they enter the middle schools each of the you know kids has had this equal education opportunities up to that point because they're fairly disparate now mmhmm unless you have everyone on it involved if you still continue to have some elementary schools that are not part of it then you don't have the ability to create a curriculum you know throughout the entire chittenden east district that would give you a consistent education and a uniform education and then also you'd lose the ability you know from the aspect of you know like sometimes you have to reduce staff in one school and that was pointed out as one of the advantages well if you don't have all the schools involved that gets limited as well about being able to you may have to lay someone off in another school you're hiring someone you know you can't move people around which has advantages and disadvantages to the teaching staff i mean those are the things to think about i understand you know this allows people they believe you know a voice to do something on their own you know without all the towns choosing to participate but at the same token you're losing out on some of the things that really would work if all the schools were involved you know since i've been on the board which has been since gotters dwight gotters yeah the conversation has been about professional development the conversation about professional development has focused on consistent curriculum from kindergarten before there were kindergartens 1st grade through 12th grade across the district and focusing on the transitions there was a time that it was a very difficult transition for kids going from elementary schools to the middle schools and the middle schools to the high schools and i think that as we've talked about professional development you know the consistent curriculums in math the consistent curriculums in language arts are being built in to our curriculum and there's a lot of focus on that so i think you're sort of shortchanging the district david when you might be bad for calling me david i know that just slipped out but i think you're short changing the district when you talk about the district curriculums if you have a central school district like burlington where you have a number of elementary schools every 5th grader in burlington does not have the same agenda i mean the same overall agenda but not the same lesson plan every day you're dealing with individuals you're dealing with individual teachers and i think that the standards and i think the core curriculum will address some of that as well well and i think it's more resources than curriculum i'd say it's the resources that are different the curriculum is common and pretty solid and it has been for the last several years it's really about the resources and implementation and the differences in the amount of money that can go to professional development and embedded professional development and technology it's different across the board so there are differences and that does affect student learning and in fact students success over the long run i mean when you have one district that may have a surplus and it could have been used in some different ways to help offset a deficit in another place there's some real benefits to that to the taxpayer and those are some of the hidden i think and that is acknowledging that i respect everybody's opinion too you know i understand that this is a very important discussion and that there are people that are very passionate about it but here's a couple of the realities that are setting in right now that i think it's important for me to share with you we have some of our small school districts they're in a really tough position and they're gonna be forced to either do some sort of merger or you know god forbid in my opinion you know tuitioning of students or something because their budgets will be dismantled over the longterm because of our edfunding structure and some of the legislation that's in place right now excess spending threshold it is punitive and they're talking about lowering that and it's gonna catch up to every one of our small school districts very soon they're talking about getting rid of the small schools grant they're talking about getting super majorities if budgets exceed inflation one and you understand that when you have a small budget there's volatility and there's volatility based on a few kids that move in and out because of edspending for equalized pupil so they're in a really tough spot really right now it's bolton and underhill id which you know you had act eighty two that applied to id and then bolton you know they had a budget that failed which is the first time i think anybody can remember and i think right behind them is going to be underhill center and huntington and jericho and then richmond richmond is probably in the best position right now so there are things that are happening that are beyond the control of boards that are really pushing this conversation yes in your opinion what is the benefit the state is seeing to push these things i mean it sounds like moneywise right they are looking to save themselves money and not spend it mmhmm why are we going here what's going on well i think they're really low there's a big movement in and again i mean please talk to your legislators i'm getting this from people i talked to and what i read and the interactions that i have but people are looking at an economy of scale and it's not just vermont it's states across the country and some internationally they're really struggling to fund some of the small schools because they are expensive right but they're still gonna have a small school right in a red yes potentially potentially and so where yeah where do we shift resources we just take them out of high school to keep those little ones afloat or we close them right i mean those are the options i mean we're not talking about saving a tremendous amount of money we're talking about economies of scale but that's certainly not on the order based on our ed you're right i mean we looked at it there isn't gonna be a windfall of money by merging in the structure that we have right now yeah there are some efficiencies so and there are some structural pieces that over time might save money mmhmm but it's hard to define what those are mmhmm but really the way that i have the funding system is set up as sort of what and some of the incentives i think are part of it that are influencing and impacting communities if we kept the structure just like we have it now there isn't a ton of money to be saved sorry i'm just gonna follow up on the question i'm still not clear about really what the formation of the district would serve in that case of the modified union school district so we're not gonna save a lot of money but you're saying that the reason to do this is because of these sort of impending financial dilemmas well some of the legislature is perpetuating it for sure right no but if we formed you know a red or an musd mmhmm i'm still not clear on how that would solve the problem that you're describing for the elementary schools well their equalized pupil would go up immediately yeah like bolton and with the incentives i could answer that and i have a slide in here i'll get to that shows what some of the savings would have looked like for some of the smaller school districts yeah maybe i mean right now bolton is the number one school in the state for excess spending okay there's no school in the state that spends more over the base amount than bolton is and our taxes on the slide john will show you right instead of going up two hundred and thirty six would have gone down seventy seven because when you've got a pupil count of sixty eight it's hard to lower your pupil spending it's really tough and there's some other things i wouldn't say defend but really outline some of the things that bolton can't control they are in chittenden county they're tied to a contract that is much different than you would see in washington west which is right across the you know right across the line or in addison or in franklin they have a demographic in their staffing that is at a place in their career that their salaries are higher on average than you know other districts and so those are some of the things that they're influenced by that they don't really have any control over but merging would really have a big impact on their equalized pupil spending pretty quick if not immediately and id as well which would i'm just trying to clarify then that would essentially just address the tax issue mm yeah okay all right we wouldn't see a huge savings you know in the overall budgets right okay all right i mean i think of all people well i've said that over and over again that we wouldn't see a huge savings and there are some savings that we could not define and the committee was real clear about that as well what i see as the benefit is expanding some student opportunities for students flexibility in the way we use our building those are the things that i think are the big benefits from a merger and looking at sharing more resources you know those are the things that i see as benefits john when you say sharing resources that means we're also sharing staff yes right that's a big deal that would help a lot of our students yeah yeah i mean every year and this is an example every year or not every year but often we'll have a school system in one of our districts that they're on the edge of whether they want or they need a rif teacher or not and they're looking at the next year and then the next year it looks like they're gonna have you know an uptick in their population and then you have another school district down the road that is debating oh my gosh you know we need to hire another teacher and yes it would have to be some reconfiguration and this is just me saying this and this is from my perspective as somebody that has followed and been involved in school district budgets for the last fifteen years with boards i think sustaining ten kids in a classroom is not possible anymore we have done it and school districts have done it in our system and across the state and i just don't think that's possible anymore so we're gonna have to really be looking at resource allocation so do you wanna go to twenty six students or thirty students or do you wanna have class sizes of fifteen i mean those are some of the questions or fourteen or thirteen that we're gonna be grappling with over the long haul yes if we went to an mmuussd opportunity would that also allow us to determine the placement mmhmm of 5th graders easily could we say that the 5th graders belong if we decide they belong better in the yes if every elementary school if every school district that we have now was part of the unified union yes what if four of the six would then no no oh okay that's different yes the one thing that you know the legislation to me it's unfortunate in one aspect because the legislation is looking more of dollars and cents than it is looking at the quality of education cause the quality of education in the state of vermont is very good you know to compare us to other states is unfair because we do a much better job and yes it does cost more money you know and it's dismaying to me and it shows a lack of an expression my father used to use a lack of intensive fortitude that the legislators in vermont are not grappling with the essential question which is funding of education they run away from it consistently instead of looking at you know some sort of broadbased you know income tax and instead of sticking with something that was created in the middle ages you know in terms of how we fund education and i understand that that's not gonna be changed in the next two years but that's the question i mean that's the question that needs to be addressed in that and it really bothers me that they just don't seem to have the political courage or the educational vision to deal with it that way because what they're talking about they're just talking about dollars and they're trying to move that off their plate they don't wanna deal with it anymore you know they're saying well this is gonna be forced out to the districts we're gonna make you do this in some fashion if you don't do it voluntarily and that's not a way to affect change in education well it feels like the legislation and again this is me talking it's pushing some of this because you know what isn't healthy is when you have budgets that don't pass mmhmm you know year after year that's not healthy for a school community that's not good for your property values it's not good for anybody you know you've got communities and you've got boards and you've got systems that are really trying to look for ways that they can preserve what they have i just wanted to point out we're talking a lot of dollars here too and if we merged the districts it would help the students we wouldn't have students coming from struggling districts who are having trouble getting their teachers merging in with students where there's schools that have you know enrichment programs and math specialists and all of that and all the kids come together it's harder to teach that classroom when you have kids that have had all the extras and kids that have not so i think that we're looking at dollars too but we need to back the kids as well i'll give you another example real example sequestration so we've got these qualified school construction loans it doesn't affect them at mount mansfield but it does affect jericho and richmond that they were supposed to get a zero or really low interest loan on their qualified school construction loans well they're not funding those qualified school construction bonds so they're gonna have interest that they have to pay that they didn't know about mm and while you know i haven't seen the final end of year estimate but mmu is probably gonna have a surplus and so you've got these districts that are running these deficits some of them they have no control over it who could have predicted that nobody hmm and then you have another district in the same su that is gonna be running a surplus and so you have this district that right off the bat they've got to raise the percentage of their budget and their tax rate right off the bat without doing anything and it could be things that they have no control over and then you'll have another district that will maybe be able to reduce the impact of the tax rate so maybe it comes out in the wash but it really it's getting more and more difficult for our small school districts to present budgets that don't look like there's a huge increase in the tax rate increase from year to year allison i don't who is allison yeah and unfortunately john unfortunately i think for some people that that is like the whole point i was in montpelier today and i had a discussion with a few senators about exactly the thing that i think clark was talking about the fact that our central problem really is the way education is funded in vermont with a regressive tax structure and many of these people are actually aware of that i don't know just what will be done to try to change that it's really important i think to separate the issues of what can we do as a community how can we work together to provide the best education how can we utilize our resources in the most efficient way so that everybody can benefit to the maximum amount that's possible how can we do that and then the other side of that is the law that was passed supposedly to permit this or to encourage it has some very serious legal flaws in it some real snags which actually i think are constitutionally threatened i have written a little piece on it a one page piece on it that i wrote a little while ago but i'd like to point out a few things about this law there is an accumulation of five hundred and fifty thousand in rewards for research which favors redistricting which is also paid for by public funds a financial reward for a predetermined result of research renders the research invalid if research obtained in this manner is used to persuade voters and administrators then it's frightening to think of the implications this could have on the merits of the issue now i don't know what research is available that we can find but i'm working on it to find what has happened to the quality of education in some of the states that have already done redistricting like maine and massachusetts i'm familiar with some people from those states who think that it was a paramount mistake some of the technical problems regarding this newly modified red which is the section seventeen on this law that we're talking about the way the law reads if the majority of towns vote for the red and a minority vote against it those who voted for it will by default wind up in a modified red some citizens might favor a red while not favoring a modified red this is very confusing to the voter and creates an ethical dilemma because of the unfair division of assets either in losing whole account assets which i think you're not interpreting the law in the way it says or in taking assets from the neighboring town because it looks to me and anne o'brien the richmond representative when she read this she was absolutely horrified she went running to montpelier and found out that it couldn't be corrected until the next session which is like taking place now the constitution says that election shall be free from corruption when you use public funds to reward people who vote for a certain agenda that's bribing votes essentially i think that's a form of corruption and i think that when you have a law that is supposed to further education it sounds like it's about education but it has these kinds of problems and implications in it i think this is a danger to our democracy and i think we need to ask the legislature for a better law and for that reason i think it's unethical to try to bring this matter to a vote in this community at this time first thank you allison what some of our board members are also saying is this that their community voted for it and they have a duty to bring it back to their electorate so that's the position of some board members in our elementary districts yes all of that aside cause there's a whole lot of emotion and a lot of concern about sort of everyone's private town and private school and everything and i really go along with what michael had said earlier this always for me was about how we can expand the opportunities for our kids with these small schools set in separate spots whether we save money along the way you know whatever the laws were were really not in the forefront certainly of my mind when i saw you know what we could do and i keep thinking about the successful from what i hear experiments that have been done they're not experiments what they've done in burlington with having unique you know academies kind of the magnet schools that could teach in a different way that could meet different needs and so that we could have options for our kids that maybe don't do as well in a traditional setting or would like to be in the arts academy or like to be in more of a sustainability or science academy it just looked like we had so many more options if we could form a group together and the other piece of it is regardless of how much we've done with the curriculum i think i had read that sorry that some of the bolton kids were coming in to the middle school less prepared i mean we still have disparities on how we reach our kids so i still think it's all about what we can do for the kids and how we can be creative and be ahead of the game whether or not they're gonna throw incentives at us to me is not the point well that was the point of the committee and that's where we tried to focus as best we could on you know and i share some not all but some of allison's instincts about this there is reason to be wary when state government says here's the money this is what we want you to do there's reasons to be wary but focusing on that for me is just looking at the wrong question for over forty years all of our communities have formed one community for the purpose of educating our children between grades five and twelve we're one community for them and we're one community for managing tax dollars we care as much about the kids even though we're representatives of richmond i know from just listening to you on the board you care as much about the kids from underhill and huntington and bolton and i think that's true for everybody on this board that was i think at the time that it happened there's probably no institutional memory that was probably a bold experiment for those people because they were getting together outside their towns to form this district to make this work and i think the reason i can say it's worked is i think all of us now we're not perfect but that this school district does a good job educating students and it does a good job managing tax dollars sure we can do better and that's our aspiration but we're a community that works you know why given that we know this community works for our students grades five through twelve given that we know it's an efficient organization why would we say okay here's gonna be our system we have one community great enough to handle everybody grades five through twelve and we're gonna have six other communities with disparate resources different abilities to deal with circumstances and relatively small amounts of dollars so that if something happens they really don't have wiggle room in their budget we're gonna make you responsible for everybody who is prek through four because we think that serves the local control or it's the way we've done it i just don't think that argument resonates i think what makes sense for us is to think hard about we really ought to be one community for all of those students whether it's prek through twelve and we really ought to have the ability to provide all of them with the opportunities to provide all of the efficiencies that i think are in that model and that's really what drives me on this it would be nice for somebody who is pressed on property taxes to see us some savings for a couple of years but that to me is not a decision because it only is for a couple of years to me the real question is does it make sense to have this mount mansfield community really assume responsibility for all our students so that we really are not divided in that anymore so that's the way i look at it i feel like in a way that's kind of arbitrary because if we follow that train that argument to its final conclusion then why don't we have one board for the whole state like all the boards right all care about all their kids as equally as we care about ours are interested in you know the taxpayers money and their education but the point is there is a value of having a small unit access for your town to access government be involved in that tight local you know granular way and there's also a benefit to what you're saying where we come together as a high school and we share things and we go back and forth to our towns having both i believe provides a synergy taking away that smaller step i think there are things that would be lost as well may i respond just briefly and then you'll knock on with it i don't think anybody's in charge we're free flowing yeah again i think that's a valid point to think about i really i don't think that that's something that anybody even me i wouldn't dismiss it what drives me though to reach the conclusion i have is that i kind of think this mount mansfield union school district is in some respects the just right stance all of our political towns have already formed that one community where we work together i think it's a model that we know can work among all of our political tenants and if somebody were coming to me and saying the suggestion is that all of our schools be merged into a chittenden county school district or that the chittenden county school district supervisor unions be arbitrarily reduced by half and that you have to join one of those bigger supervisory unions i'd be much more resistant i just think that we in our communities together have that track record of working together and forming that community that really can provide that level of local control but having said that i think it's a valid point for us to think on mmhmm cliffe was no conner was ahead of me oh okay i understand i'm sixty and not taxpayer so you can kind of take it with a grain of salt like to your point about if you take the same logic and apply it to the state i think the education that happens in rutland doesn't directly affect mount mansfield but because all of these elementary schools do eventually funnel into this one board the decisions that are made on these local towns do eventually impact mmhmm the school the mount mansfield and it is true that the curriculums of elementary schools have been much more standardized so that there's less challenge from school to school but to the point of the student that's elementary school was every single year not sure if their teachers would have a job i think that would have an implication and because we're the size that we could have all the students that would become part of this one group come together realistically and we can still make decisions on towns that eventually will impact the board that already is in the state yeah i appreciate the point about local and you can understand the historical way this developed you know there's no longer an elementary school on upper english settlement road or an irish settlement gabriela and so on the populations change transportation corridors change in fact we've got one that runs north to south through the whole district i'm a big city kid but i have some small town experience and i think the population of our five towns is on the order of what seventeen or eighteen thousand right around there yep okay about the size of my father's hometown of hannibal missouri which has one high school one middle school it's inconceivable to me that the town of hannibal would have eight separate school districts with eight separate funding mechanisms eight separate tax calculations it's separate staffing arrangements and so on it doesn't work that way my cousins tell me it work just fine the way it is with one school board you know for eighteen thousand people it just seems to me that although i would not want a statewide school board that in this situation the efficiencies the relief of pressure on small schools which are scarcity viable to sixty eight students vastly outweigh considerations of locality for the prek to four since as michael points out were already consolidated after that just seems like an odd camel that's been constructed here jeff i think and just an observation i think ken and michael are talking about two sides of the same coin that being of trust in terms of a four year relationship with five towns that we trust each other to act in each other's interests whereas correct me if i'm wrong the voice of ken and allison voicing some skepticism as to taking that to the next level but that we're not able to go the full measure because we're not sure whether that trust is going to extend to the full thing we can say well we've got k through four under our control you know that's really the important developmental age and then we'll allow it to go to the greater common good if you will i'm not saying i have an answer i'm just saying what was more arbitrary was the brigham decision because that came down from the supreme court and that was about you know equal access to education and so you had stratton paying nineteen thousand a kid or whiting having three thousand that was arbitrary you know the gold towns all got multiple formulas and over time it's changed vermont was the community the statewide community that wouldn't work in i grew up in new york there's no way that would work in new york at any level at any subset so the question is where do we extend the trust are we going to trust that this board or any board is gonna work in the interest of all the kids based on an existing bond if we didn't have that i think this would be a massive leap but we're in that we're in that no man's land right now we do have a choice we could still choose not to do it but we do have a choice and i think that puts us in a unique position to weigh all these factors it doesn't make it any easier i come down on the trust issue and that's where we need to work because that's what's gonna happen going forward we're gonna need to trust each other to be clear for me it's not about trust i think that this school and the system can run perfectly well without any of us here and probably you know that would be fairly freeing i mean however it shakes out i think we will continue to have a successful school however i think part of the reason that we can have that kind of trust is because we do that work thoroughly throughout our communities and i feel like having that smaller step is part of what makes you trustworthy for the rest of the towns because i don't know there's something to be said about i don't know having your elementary school that might be the focus or you know i might be wrong but it seems like in bolton that elementary school is central right to their community there and in a way that if it was removed it's gonna be very detrimental to them that doesn't mean that that's not what should happen that doesn't mean that's not what's best for the kids that doesn't mean i'm just saying they should be the ones to decide what's right for that as opposed to the rest of us that's all i guess i have to disagree okay i spent twenty five years working in small schools and i've heard this argument over and over and over that the school is the center of town we can't exist without it twenty five years in a small school the only people that came through that school during the school day were parents which was sometimes eighteen of the population the rest of the town did not come through that school when the school was in session yeah it's a nice building to use for the rec league at night and for your meetings et cetera et cetera et cetera that doesn't change whether it's one board for the school or one board for the district the building's still there for the use by the community but i just don't see this the town lives for the school the parents who have kids in the school when the kids are in the school it's the center of their life when the kids come to the 5th grade the middle school becomes the center of their life when they come to the high school the high school becomes the center of their life the building's still there for the use by the community the other thing that struck me as we were talking about this is i like probably many of you did not grow up in a state that had any kind of system like this where there was a single board it was a county system i feel like my education where it got me how involved my parents were in the community how involved we were with the school was the same the same pto the same you know complaining about things the same involvement in cleaning up and caring about coming to field days and participating so the community is not we tend to think because this is what we know that it's linked to the size that we have existing and that's a state of mind it's a bit of physicality but it's also a state of mind and it can be expanded so i think something that was missing from the previous discussions of the red were the comments from the principals i didn't hear the principals step up and say this is how it will affect our school i wonder why we didn't hear from the principals and during this discussion what benefit that might have to community members to hear what the principals feel about how we would there were some that had spoke i was gonna say yeah i mean we had some i was a member yeah of the red group last time mmhmm and i actually went and talked to principals at the schools and brought their opinions too if they weren't coming we did that we went to the schools i think right dave everybody talked to the principals i think the public needs to hear that they should have an they had the opportunity they just didn't come to the meetings right but how many meetings they didn't speak up do you want them to go cause they had a lot they have a lot yeah i didn't hear any of the principals i think none of them said that they were against some merger in some ways it would make their life more efficient and help them to focus more on what's going on in their school instead of what's going on at the board level you know i asked cindy mac at the time to speak up and she said that she's not been asked to so she won't but i think that we should ask the principals to go public about their views on how it will affect their schools because that would sway the popular opinion on the benefits of this or not make it more public david dave sorry dave were you referring to me no they're not that's not even my real name whatever johnboy yeah yes the guards are coming i know that this discussion is sort of free flowing i guess where are we going and i mean this could go on for a long time and you know i'm not as young as it used to be and i'd just like to put a little structure into this so that we can see a conclusion to this discussion so i have a couple more slides okay let's do them yeah and we'll go to it i'm just gonna keep going here is a advantage four years of decreasing tax incentives you folks know that for some of the merger options the union merger districts can receive a transitional facilitation grant of up to one hundred and fifty thousand or five of the base set amount multiplied by the combined enrollment of the merging districts there's one hundred and fifty thousand transitional grant for some other merger options and five thousand for early exploration or feasibility studies for two districts that might wanna merge but don't know if it's viable so here's a chart trying to help you just see what the summary of what the reimbursements and the incentives looks like in the merger type the red is on the top the union elementary it's not really a red you can see what the incentives are good mmhmm and i included this slide just as an example of what it might've looked like with an 8cent tax incentive the most important part i would say is really focused on what would probably make the most sense would be here and here with nonred this is based on one hundred thousand house and then with the red john yes whenever i see this i always wonder these tax incentives go away in a few years right they do so for me the real question is four years what would the tax savings be you know when the incentives are gone are there any tax savings hard to say i mean i would just request when we talk about this and present it to the public or whoever does that's a really important issue and it goes to what alison was saying i wouldn't want the public to be miss or misunderstand that those tax incentives are only lasting just for a short amount of time when they decline too yes right and they're public funds so i think it's just an important thing that the public knows when we discuss it that's the only thing if especially you say that we don't even know if there'll be lower once the incentives go away right right we've been right okay we'd have to see what the budgets are right okay there's so many unknowns you know based on what will happen at the legislature good point then here's a link we've had a lot of questions refer to that you know it is an important topic to several school districts in our community i'm not sure you have a real direction or certainly we can take a position as it were you know i think if it's possible i think that might be useful information to the executive committee even a straw poll to say that if the majority of the school districts or elementary districts want to pursue a modified unified union school district that the board would not be lobbying against that or that they could live with that can i ask just i guess it's a point of order if we take a poll or a vote is it binding well i would say we no the people aren't going to lobby against it no but it would be good to get in the minutes right okay i'd hope what to say what the position of the board is not that it's binding but it gives like a highlight it gives some historical information for the public and it gives judy some feedback that she can bring to the executive committee i have a clarification question if we're voting are we voting to endorse the reactivation of the study committees or are we voting to endorse creation of the i think my recommendation would be voting to support a merger and a merger study if the majority of the elementary boards vote to do so okay somebody would like make a motion to that effect somebody along here could well why couldn't you yeah well that's yeah what he said what he said is that what let me see a motion to support huhuh huhuh to support not even i mean there's some semantics here but support the formation of a merger committee a merger study if a majority of the elementary school boards want to move forward in such a manner she said so be it so i'll second is that what you said to me yeah i think he did a good job of repeating it i thought it was fine a good lane as we are that's okay okay okay discussion diane i just wanna say that this is just a really really important discussion and that if we do nothing else and if we have to schedule another hour so that everyone can really delve into this and express their opinions express their concerns i think that that would be so important and the only thing i fear sort of if we go right to a study is that we lose these bigger voices because we consolidate down to a smaller group but i think that this discussion has been very very helpful and i think we're getting to a point where we're kind of tired of the financial part and we're really looking at how this is gonna benefit our community and our kids so i'm not sure i don't know about the study but even if they do well they have to do they would have to do a they have to do a study a articles of agreement they'd have to look at what the formation would look like they have to follow the statutory steps it wouldn't have to be a full blown governance study because we've already done that if we hadn't done that we couldn't even bring it to the statutory steps but forming a committee and talking about what this would mean for the districts that merge and what the articles of agreement might look like and what the structure of the district would look like stipulating that dave i really agree with diane's answers and i would like to expand on that i think we need another discussion about this and the reason i think we need another discussion is a so that we can get the public involved i mean tell people this is going to be the main article for discussion for this meeting and we really want you to come and listen and participate so that we can get some public feedback on this because it's gonna be a contentious issue you know if we go back out and do another study people are gonna say why are we doing this and you know just also that people can come in better informed about what all this means because it is complicated mmhmm you know i mean what the various options are les it seems like we're jumping a little too quickly here wouldn't it be that the elementary schools are the ones they have to decide if they wanna go ahead it's their school districts that are voting on it and paying for it are you asking us to tell the elementary school districts well that yeah we think it's a good idea you go ahead well no as opposed to letting the public know each school board talk to their members you are and say what do you think you're a standing board so it's pretty important that if you say we cannot live with a modified unified union school district that judy brings that back to the other elementary boards because potentially what could happen is that this board could take on some prek to four school districts okay so you know i think it's important for you folks not say necessarily endorse it but you wouldn't stand in the way you could support it and support bringing it to the electorate if a majority of the elementary districts want to pursue this do we actually have the opportunity to say we would not participate being the local high school and middle schools as it were can we say if the communities voted for this we can't opt out can we you can opt out but i think i'm pretty sure almost positive that the elementary districts would wanna know well what does the mmu board think this could have a big impact on them and then they could pursue a modified elementary district possibly okay they could yeah but we have the right we should be attending those elementary school board meetings cause we are town taxpayers and we taxpayers can bring that perspective and they should be coming here and then we can have that little talk that we've been missing but in terms of moving forward i would wanna know that that was up for the discussion and be present you know in my town while they are having those discussions i mean i'm really sure that they're gonna wanna know does the mmu board think this is a bad idea we should not be doing this and that they don't wanna change the structure i think that that would be important information for our local school boards cliff i see this as a sort of a sense of the meeting vote here it doesn't bind anybody right no to anything exactly it just says smile i think that's better go ahead and do it and if you like the idea you know or you don't like the idea and it also doesn't conflict or preempt getting the public involved getting the other boards here i was even thinking in my mind a massive meeting of all eight boards but we'd need to schedule for that i think sorry did that on monday that's okay only certain delegates so i have no trouble with the motion it's just a smile directed at the elementary boards yeah cindy yeah i agree with you if this is just the way we feel at this point in time with this information after this discussion tonight yeah yes does anybody remember the content of the resolute update of the resolution we passed that instructed our executive committee members on the positions they could take on this issue because we did pass a resolution mmhmm yup and it did bind them to specifically limit them i believe but i'm working from a faulty memory that there were limits on what they could bring up or support mmhmm and i do think if my memory's even in the ballpark we need to pass something otherwise they continue to be bound by that resolution right cause that was that resolution that we dissolve the red mm the committee the committee itself cause there was a motion we had to take that to the executive committee right from this board right sure and say that yeah but if it's dissolved and this is it's new start then we can start it no not this it was the process of being directed but that's what you're talking about right yeah i just think that i don't have it in front of me i just wanna be sure that we don't create that disconnect well and i think that'll come from the executive committee but i know i mean you can table this for another time but i think that the elementary boards would wanna know could the mmu board a majority at least support this or support the electorate voting on a modified unified union school district i'm not saying you support the concept i'm saying that you could support the electorate if a majority of the school boards want to move forward with this merger option that's all i'm saying allison yeah allison i agree with diane i think that's premature and i think that as much as i appreciate what your sentiment is cliff i think that a vote about this might be misunderstood by the public mmhmm i would not like to see us get in the situation of the classic mommy can i go to the store ask your father daddy mommy said i could go to the store is it okay you know i think we should stay out of it and let them decide yeah and then we'll continue to talk about what children need and what is appropriate for education my main concern i know i come off as being very emotional about this which i guess is true i think that i agree with michael and all these concerns that you folks all have very very passionately i agree with you i think we have the wrong legislative structure in which to work not gonna change in time that's my concern or that you don't have a position you do not have a position at this time i think that should be stated in the minutes we do have a motion so you don't on the floor we do have a motion right a seconded emotion uhhuh uhhuh yup we have seconded motion yeah we have a seconded motion we can move to table it there we go you got it excuse me i'd like to move to table it second oh dear is that it to be voted on no it's nondebatable though right it's voted on it's nondebatable but it's not debatable right and that takes precedence yeah so those in favor of tabling the motion as presented indicate by saying aye aye and those opposed no we'll do a show of hands those in favor indicate by raising your hand please of tabling it of tabling one two three four five one two three four five okay and those in favor of pursuing the motion indicate by raising your hands please one two three four five six we're back to the motion as it was originally presented is there more discussion to that we just have the motion remaining i'm sorry yes that would be great yeah chris it's going in the minutes you gotta have it to support the formation of a merger committee and study if the majority of elementary boards vote to do so okay mmhmm so that's the way the motion is yes okay more discussion not hearing any those in favor indicate by saying aye aye those opposed nay okay i think the ayes have it clearly yes go ahead but you didn't ask for the abstains and abstentions i mean abstentions and one abstention okay we will go the ayes still have it with that message to the executive committee that's fairly clear thank you for the discussion okay i'm gonna make a suggestion that we table the vision twenty calendar okay for our next june meeting we're in a informational gathering engagement part of this so you can take a look at what i provided you and then we can that will be an agenda item for our next june meeting are people okay with that mmhmm yeah cause it'll be a meaty topic i don't think we can dive into that today i can attest to that okay yes i can are there committee reports ap language classes other than those that were i gave you our recent ones it's not italian the written reports we're okay right i received the only thing that policy did was that we rescinded not rescinded we sunsetted a lot of smaller policies that are really subsumed into the contracts are there additions or corrections to the minutes of the previous meeting i have none hearing none we will approve them as written and the words they are ooh i gotta pass those around sorry oh god two hundred and fourteen million one hundred and fifty one thousand seven hundred and ninety one okay any questions or objections to the words as presented we will approve those are there announcements or other business ken john i just have a question for you in light of all the news that burlington is in the news forum last week act one went into effect in two thousand and eleven and it very clearly says that the school board of a school district shall ensure that all adults have been trained that's bus drivers cafeteria workers everybody in the district have we done that yes yes so there may be some employees that were hired during the school year that haven't had that training but folks that when we started the school year have been trained and we'll be doing it again thanks other announcements we don't need an executive session we do we do it should be pretty brief okay it's a student issue okay i move that we go into executive session for the purpose of dealing with a student issue second as soon as the room is cleared we will enter into an executive session pardon me could we have a vote on it all right because the public meeting requires us to vote on that we can have a vote those in favor of going into executive session for the purpose of discussing a student issue student issue indicate by saying aye aye thank you you need a ride oh i will hailey and conner it's okay thank you very much