Skip to main content

Rules of the Road

 



I'm reading up on the Rules of Order that the Natick School Committee has typically adopted as its way of proceeding in meetings - Robert's Rules of Order.  Wow - that's a boring thing to do on a Saturday... unless you are like me! 

Coming up this week Monday at 6:00 p.m. - Policy Review on our School Committee Re-Organization
  • The gist - We are considering revisions to chair term limits and the number of vice chairs that we have and when our organizational meeting takes place. 

Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. - Reorganization of the School Committee
  • The gist - We will volunteer, be appointed and/or be elected to serve on one of several committees of the School Committee and as liaisons to community organizations. 
  • Currently we have a Finance Committee of the Superintendent that is exempt from Open Meeting Law (See Connelly v. School Committee of Hanover, 409 Mass. 232 (1991) referenced on page 6 of this Open Meeting Law document.) which allows for the Superintendent to form a committee (in this case with 3 members of the School Committee and senior staff of Administration) to advise her on something having to do with her job.  
  • I will be making a motion that we add a Finance Subcommittee of the School Committee to the list of work to be done. 

List of Natick Public School's Committee Assignments 

 Items listed below in orange are new to this year's document - added on 4/9/2021

Entity

Permanent Appointments



Collective Bargaining Committees

Cafeteria

Director of HR



EAN ABC

Director of HR, Superintendent, Chair & two other SC Members



Secretaries

Director of HR



Paraprofessionals

Director of HR



Title 1

Director of HR



School Committee Subcommittees

Policy Review

Superintendent 



Kennedy Middle School Building Committee

Anna Nolin

Kirk Downing

Peter Gray

Andy Zitoli

Town Administrator 

Facilities Director

Other Appointees:

Bruce Evans

Jonathan Freedman 

Thomas Iskra

Stephen Meyler, Chair

Julian Munnich

John T KB racy

Elizabeth Heffler – for safety meetings (non-voting member)



Liaisons and Advisory Groups ( previous description: School Committee Appointments to Non- SC Committees)

Audit Committee




Community Senior Center Liaison




Facilities Oversight Committee

Superintendent, Director of Finance



Financial Planning Committee

Chair, Superintendent, Director of Finance



Natick 180




NEF




PCC Liaison




SEPAC




SPARK Kindness Liaison




TEC B.O.D.

Open to all SC members, Superintendent



Town Safety Committee

Director of Finance, Transportation Coordinator



Statewide Advocacy Efforts and Updates




ELPAC

one representative



*Equity Task Force

one student representative




*Racial Equity Municipal Action Plan (REMAP)

one representative



*Finance Advisory Group

three representatives



*Teen Sleep Group

three representatives



METCO

one representative                                                                    



Popular posts from this blog

Statement on Recusal

Here are the remarks I gave last night when letting my committee know my decision to recuse:  After the School Committee meeting on October 15th, several individuals wrote into the SpeakUp Natick portal requesting that I recuse myself from voting on the possible closure of Johnson.  The substance of these messages, sent to the full committee, carried a familiar refrain. The messages - often using the same language – said some version of the following:  Catherine Brunell should recuse herself from deliberating and voting on the closure of Johnson because she lacks objectivity, as her children go to school there and she is from that neighborhood. I asked myself the question if there was any merit to the request for me to recuse myself and started to do some research about why people recuse  From what I can tell from the minutes, in Natick, It’s never happened before - not with the Kennedy, Wilson or the High School - not even for members whose children were to attend t...
Read more

FY22 Natick Public Schools Appropriation $75, 063, 994

Approved 4/15/2021 by Town Meeting  -  126 - 1 - 1   Want to know what Town Meeting is and why it matter's to the budgets?  Check out this video. Quick Overview of the current budget process...    School Administration presents a budget to the School Committee at a series of  meetings School Committee considers the budget, ask questions and then votes on the budget  Town Administrator (hired position) also creates a budget for all of the departments in the town, including the schools. All of the budgets go through the Finance Committee - (15 person appointed board) - to be vetted and then voted on in sub committees and the full committee.  Finance Committee Website  - Great resource if you'd like to see all of the budgets.  School Committee and TA can make adjustments throughout the spring based on conversations at the Finance Committee. This year for example, the School Committee voted on the budget 3 separate times to land o...
Read more

Questions that I am asking or have received...

Serving in this role, I hold a seat that gives me the ability to ask my questions and yours to our administration with the hope that the questions reinforce our strategic goals. I've long relied on the value that, "two heads are better than one."  So here are some of the questions that the School Committee has been asked this week by parents and constituents: Cameron Middle School in Framingham 1) Will outdoor structures be used in the fall to allow for outdoor mask breaks when the weather is poor or lunch in a safer setting?   While this falls into an operational issue at the school and is not typically in the purview of the School Committee, because of COVID we have an  interim COVID policy  (page 120) where it is stated that the school committee establishes an emergency, interim policy to promote public safety and safety of students and faculty.   Perhaps one example of the use of the application of this policy could be seen in the March 15th School...
Read more