was john failed in the superintendent of the public schools i'm here to give you a quick update on all things are happening in the bubble in public schools it will have a special feature on the belmont high school building committee first of all would like to announce that we are very proud to say that the belmore public school students and their outcomes in the last years testing session in season resulted in a level one standing by the state for each one of our six schools and as a district as a whole that is the highest level of achievement that one school and or district can achieve and we're very proud of our students are proud of our teachers it we look forward to our teachers and students working well each year to maintain that high level of rigor and student outcome like to acknowledge the burbank school who also received special note from the state for their increased growth this year as well and also at the butler school and very special at the school we got recognized by the national  blue ribbon school committee which is a federal national award that only three schools in the commonwealth of massachusetts received the butler school was one of those three the butler schools a national blue ribbon school and has been recognized as such in m of the butler will be down in washington d c next weekend to receive the award or be half of the staff the students and the family we could not be prouder of mike all the teachers all the aides the lunch staff the custodial staff at the butler the students and all the parents in that very tight community for their hard work and dedication and growth over the last few years and the great student outcomes that we get out of the butler school congratulations to all we'd also like to talk about one of the pressure points that has come up a few times at these school committee meetings which is our roman we've been reporting each of the last three years of the increases in a moment that we see in the belmont public schools over the last few years this year was no different from last september to this september we have seen an increase of one hundred five students entering the belmont public schools that's a net new number now increased to a school system of almost forty four hundred students that's a very large increase from just five years ago of about five hundred students w continue to work with our principals and our families and our teachers to ensure that we have good spaces for our children to learn and balance our class size it should be noted that this year we did add three marginal caution to the high school building which now has six we added six mar classrooms to our middle school to ensure a good space for teaching and learning and we also reallocated space at the burbank school and added a class there as well so lots going on with the roman that's driving a lot of our demands and challenges this year and belmont public schools and over time we look forward to working on those challenges and one of the nice parts of that challenge is that we heard good news from the state last year from the massachusetts school building authority and we have been granted a partnership with the state to build a new high school so we have formed of belmont high school building committee last spring and we have been meeting from spring through the summer and would like to give you an update today on that information and we also have a number of the belmont high school school building committee with us jamie hood shea so let me first give you some information the  s p a is an organization that's created funds by the state to support schools and school districts in building new schools we partnered with the m s b a because they will fund up to thirty percent of the entire building project that any district takes on and that funding is crucial to making this building possible as you can see from the the model behind me that they have a process that all school systems must follow in order to build a new space for a new high school elementary or middle school it involves eight modules that every dish would have to walk their way through in order to begin in complete a building program in your city your town it starts off with the eligibility period moves through forming of a project team which we're getting ready to do here in belmont goes into a feasibility study which will really dig down into deep of what does this town want for school and what that school look like and what the educational program will be of that school then they'll be a schematic design period with that building is drawn up by an architect and then they'll be a vote on funding at some point in time after that schematic is presented to the community and then a detailed design will be performed and then the construction will start ending with completing the project and hopefully having students and at a very reasonable time that overall scheme addict that you just saw and that process i would like to go into the eligibility period which is the period that we're in right now as you can see from your screen there was a list of deliverables that needed to be presented to the state by belmont in order to complete this first phase eight of those ten modules are eight of those ten pieces and deliverables have been already submitted to the state with only two remaining pieces that will be presented by the end of this week those are the enrollment certification letter that needs to be signed and then actual the feasibility study agreement which is also a contract to be signed by the board of selectmen the school committee and myself in order to take that next step we're very thankful to the facilities department the selectmen the school committee all the principals that took part in gathering up the data to help submit these deliverables from last may all the way through the month of october of two thousand and sixteen very exciting the next part of this process will be to decide what configurations may make sense for the district to explore as part of that feasibility study we need to explore different configurations other than a high school that might support the town and what i mean by that is that we just talked about one hundred five more students coming to belmont we all know that the enrollments been increasing and we asked the state is there any way that we can use this state funding for the new high school to support a different configuration that may take the pressure off the middle school or the elementary school as it relates to high in roman and class size the m s p it was very interested in hearing what we would propose so the page that you see in front of you work great configurations were proposed back in the summer we asked them to consider a nine to twelve high school which was what the initial application stated we asked them to consider ninety twelve high school plus an integrated preschool and akin to garden space and building we asked them for a nine through twelve high school and also potentially could we also build an elementary school on the same site we also asked them to consider eight through twelve school in a seven through twelve school so why did we ask for those configurations the group that got together to propose these options to the state tried to think of every in any combination of grades that we could that would support taking that very large role meant that we see at the elementary middle and high school in leveraging that with a building that may serve and salvage some of our class size and building needs at all of those levels the state decided after considering all five options that they would only consider three that we proposed the three options moving forward would be a nine through twelve school again the original application and eight through twelve school which would be a balancing act between an eight nine academy and a ten through twelve school or however the district chooses to move it forward in a seven through twelve school all of those configurations have strengths and may have some challenges and that's the work that the community will do over the next year or so and that's the work that our education facilitator will do with us staff and community as well as our architect and or a project manager so we look forward to that next leg of work in the belmont public schools so i leave the last slide for you which is the building process so i can talk with my partner here from the building the belmont high school building committee  jamie as a parent you may know jamie as a teacher at the high school as the former president of the foundation for belmont education but right now she's wearing the hat of all of those plus belmont high school building committee welcome jamie th good to have you so this now that we've started the school year this topic has definitely taken front and center for the community and you've been at the meeting since last april and part of the discussions and you actually pitched it for me at the middle school p t o meeting to represent the work of the high school project what are some of the questions that you're receiving out there from parents and staff about the project well i think you know parents what the big question is you know when is it going to open everybody wants to know when the doors  especially at the elementary level those parents are really interested because theoretically very students will be able to attend the new high school cherry middle school the main concern of parents is going to be the impact on the current fifth or eighth grade because presumably some or most of those students will be attending the high school during something is of the construction project whatever that is so a lot of the questions concerned you know what kind of impact is going to have on my child and then the last concern that parents have or not concerned  question revolves around the three great configurations that we ended up as meeting to the m s b a what's that going to look like what does a seven through twelve campus look like what does an eight through twelve campus look like how is this going to affect the seventh and eighth graders that are currently have a cherry and also how is this going timing in when will the school open and when will students be able to start the new high school i definitely think is is an open question in the chart that we provided the m s b a building process the m b a and folks who have served on the e building committee and on the wellington build a community all say you have to take your time with the process take its course so we don't want to give any dates prematurely we do know that we're heading out of the first module eligibility by the end of the end of the week in the beginning of november and we do know will be entering the forming a team the critical moment i think for belmont as relates to the other questions is will we build that team what kind of work do we have to do as a community with teachers with parents to talk about what the building will look like and how do we how do we want to serve our students best what's interesting about belmont is that some high schools are just i want to build a new nine through twelve school what is that going to look like belmont has decided to try to leverage this funding in leverage this opportunity to see if we can relieve pressure at the elementary or middle school grades so that's important for the parents and the community to know that's why we've presented three different configurations so it will be our work with the community the school department a school committee we will hire an education facilitator who will meet with parents meet with teachers meet with students to ask them what do you think this building will look like if it's seven through twelve how would we arrange it what would it look like from a general perspective what would an eight to twelve building look like and what would a nine through twelve building look like the nice part about that is that will give people a very clear picture of what that school could look like and they could see their child making their way through that day and what that campus would look like would they have different start times would they have different principals in the seven through twelve how many students that mean in a seven to twelve so we're really excited about having those conversations because we can clarify that picture then the community will know or have a better understanding about what those will look like and then they'll be a choice made about which path will go down and secure as a community the  nice part that will come after that will be after we decide and one of those configurations then we'll dig deep into what do we want the school to look like around students around educational programming around what we can offer and how to space help bring that programming to life so that's go exciting conversation that i know as a teacher you look for that too as well so and so the question about what happens to middle and what happens to elementary parents now i was at the burbank school p t o reading a few weeks ago and i could see all the kindergarten parents thinking in all the first grade parents thinking oh that's great my child will be a freshman then are my child will be a sophomore so we're asking everybody to pause a little bit so we can get through this process but i would be worried too if i was a general parent that unknown about how we're going to work our school logistics during this time and i know that that was done very well during the wellington time period in the building project in depending on the design and depending on what configuration we choose the architect will be working with the high school building team the project team about how we can organize that facilitation so to your point i think that as a high school teacher you would know that the same expectations for staff would be there that have to be a lot more support for staff to probably get through some of the challenging years but we would support our staff that would make sure that the school safe that's a good learning environment regardless of the shifting that may have to happen and what that looks like will find oh yeah and i think a couple of really good points to make to especially to middle school parents whose kids probably will at some point be in the building while some of the construction is going on are to fall number one this is not the first time that belmont has  had a major building construction project for a school in the near future in the recent future and the lives and both of which were you know not terribly long ago and both of them went very very well were very smoothly conducted to that i would say the building committee itself is made up of a lot of veterans and school building projects there's the building committee has a very strong representation of people that have been involved in other capital projects in the town specifically schools so they bring a wealth of knowledge with which is great and the other piece i would say is belmont has fantastic schools and the main reason they have fantastic schools is because of the fact and staff that works in them and the high school has been old in the you know we've been complaining about the building of the high school for years but the level of achievement of the students has not gone down if anything it's gone up and so the expectation obviously is that those kids even though there may be some disruption to their physical surroundings the educational quality is not going to change and so parents can rest assured that their that their students are going to be getting a top notch education at the high school regardless of what stage of the building process there if they're students then i can't agree more people like bob  brush both members of the belmont high school building committee have been through several building projects and have been major players in the town's success over the last more than few years and bill of allah who is to the committee chair came in at the end of the wellington project to help bring that school building project over the finish line in become occupied in actually just settled up the books just in june of two thousand and sixteen to make sure it all worked so i do think that we're in good hands ironically i was part of a strict that did six schools over over a five year period of time so having experienced the the construction while you're simultaneously having children go to school as a building principal you always want to make sure that you're able to get students in and out safely that you're providing good conditions for teachers to work in if it's in for students to learn and that sometimes needs extra support from central office and from other parts of the budget that we will absolutely provide right because our goal is not to miss a tick while we're going to the process for all those students that we had in the meantime all great questions any other questions that folks are asked so i think the only other question is in the near term so you know we're bout to finish the end of our first eligibility eligibility period which is our first module which is fantastic right on schedule and so moving into the second when we're starting out the design team and start these abilities study i think the community is interested in knowing you know what's the timeframe for the next year you know how are they going to be involved are there going to be community forums where they can sort of express their opinions and ask questions specifically on the three great configurations or timing and that kind of thing so we have been working behind the scenes to secure the work of a education facilitator who has worked with the m s p a in cities and towns like duxbury situ at mass to bring teacher student in community voice into the educational programming discussions that help build the school so i have been phone contact and e mail contact with frank locker up till today probably about three hours ago and we will be planning sessions that help us on pack that great configuration story that's the first story that we have to make sure that we all understand have feedback on it impact the input on when we get that information we'll carry it into what i consider to be forming the project module which is our next module to hand over to a project manager and the architect who we hire and say this is what the town sees as these three options looking like can you bring those to life from an architectural point of view so we can start to build and paint a better picture for folks to look at and make decisions on so that work will take place i believe from probably december when we start having forms through june of the school year so what we can count on for the school year hiring it education facilitator from the schools perspective in the building of high school project teams perspective hiring in order project manager hiring an architect with those folks on board which is building the team and that's the module will be and we'll be able to meet with parents meet with teachers meet with students meet with the community and give the architect some  data and information that we want them to include in this bigger picture when that's done my understanding is that will take some time to maybe draw some conceptual models of what that could look like and i think we'll probably get back in september of eighteen a ctually september of seventeen would seem like a long time away but when you think about all the steps that have to happen between then i think by that time the the tower will start to look at which option they would like to choose and that will be a very big discussion a big decision on behalf of the community so if you want to look at the next twelve months or the next year i think that that's the work over the next twelve months that's sounds great and i think that that the community looks forward to having that dialogue i would like to say that i am honored to be part of this committee i found find it to be a very impressive group of people that are working towards us and i think this is a really exciting time for obama i agree in i have to say what i what i think is unique to belmont is that the level of support and partnering between town hall the school's board of selectmen the w committee the capital committee the school committee there really is a lot of good relationship ships that have been built in there continue which will actually make the work a lot easier if everybody's on the same page moving forward this group being led by bill of  alo with a lot of good experience on there i think were very good hands in the town couldn't be more proud of that group of people moving this this big project forward it'll be the biggest project at the time and probably has seen in a long time in s c for a while so we look forward to using as not only looking at a new high school but again you know with all the challenges that we see across k to twelve with the amount of students in the lack of space it will be a real big decision for the town to make a run how they want to leverage this project and we look website that we're to feed information through so we'll post that on the school website as well the goal for the the belmont high school building committee is to be transparent post the minutes the meetings are open meetings if you'd like to come the next meeting is thursday october twenty seventh at seven thirty am in the home or building in the art museum on the fourth floor we welcome anybody who would like to attend we have had spectators at several meetings and then at that meeting will probably schedule the next ten or so meetings and it will be a different times that will give the public the ability to see the go in the morning or the afternoon or the evening so jamie thank you for having me on what media they're a great partner for the belmont public schools to help us get our word out thank you to all the staff and thank you to all of our parents and