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.

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...

Let’s Have a Vision for Elementary Schools.

Faced with some monumental school facility and space decisions, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the quote that Dr. Nolin has below the signature line in her email: The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new. The emphasis in the quote is on what can come next. It is not about holding on tightly to what was, nor looking at an issue through only a technical, logistical lens but on moving forward with vision . The administration, under advisement of the School Committee, is charged with setting that vision. The School Committee is charged with protecting that vision using the three roles within our domain - budget, policy and supervision of the Superintendent. All of us are working for the kids that are here today and those who will be here in the future. Thankfully this time, as our School Committee grapp...

Vaccines

The School Committee agenda for Monday, September 20th can be seen here . (separate blog coming about the rest of the agenda...) Mandates for student vaccinations for students participating in extracurricular activities, school and club sponsored events and athletics will be discussed and possibly voted on. I have asked that the documents be linked asap so you can read it yourself but until then... The Quick Summary: The draft policy is a mandate for students who are age-eligible through FDA approved vaccinations. In the case of a student who age eligible and is not vaccinated, a weekly PCR test is required. How many of our students are vaccinated? Department of Health (DPH) - Vaccine tracker - click on weekly municipal report to see chart below and compare. columns are: county, town, age range, # of people in that group, % that is that age, # of age group partially vaxed, proportion of full town partially vaxed, fully ...

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