Skip to main content

School Committee Re-Org

Next week, you will see us working on the organization of the Natick School Committee! You elected us, now we elect and appoint one another.  

We will select a chair and will determine the make up of the rest of the committee using or re-vising our policies. The Natick School Committee Policy Manual can be found here.  (See pages 43-45 for re-organization.) 

The policy subcommittee met yesterday to consider revisions of the current policy including eliminating the Vice Chair of Finance position and allowing for an extension of the 2 year limit of the chair. The agenda from that meeting can be found here.  The last major revision of this policy, discussed in April of 2020, resulted in adding the Vice Chair of Finance to the committee. 

What makes an effective board?  

That's a question I've been asking others for months. Obviously there is no one answer, but here's a screen shot from a publication by the National School Board Association. Click here for the full presentation.  

What's important about the chair?  

Here's a screen shot of a description by the Massachusetts School Committee Association. Full presentation is here.  


 


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