The only thing that is constant is change...

Picture taken on a Brunell vacation of Bryce Canyon - National Park.
These structures, hoodoos, have been there for millions of years AND they change all of the time because of the elements within the environment. 
 

Tonight at Natick's Select Board meeting, tune into to hear about the proposal for a committee to study... drum roll please.... Town Government change. Here is the description in the agenda:

The full Select Board agenda can be found here. 

School Committee Business Meeting - In person and Virtual tonight, 12/15 at 6:30 p.m. 

(rescheduled b/c of the power outage last week - thank you Pegasus for finding a way to do both Select Board and School Committee in one night! We are doubled book but try not to do this as much as possible.) 

Click here for the agenda.

In an effort to shorten the meetings, questions are sent to Dr. Nolin before the meeting from Committee members. See the document where they are compiled here. 

I asked the following questions about ESSERS spending and how we will measure the efficacy of our COVID Recovery plans:  

I would like to hear the rationale of the new proposals - why are you choosing these over other choices on the original list or over extending the money in year 2 to secure positions already hired and that we will most likely need? I am especially interested to hear about the $80k high school sub positions. It seems to be a need that we’ve not experienced before and mostly around behavior. Correct me if I am wrong but these new hires will be monitoring the hallways, bathrooms and providing classroom management support. 

These are the items the principals indicated were acute at this time and were most important at this time.  In addition, I meet with staff (Superintendent advisory group) each month and the positions were also affirmed by that group as needed.  All of us would also like more interventionists but we are not fully able to hire.  We are, however, flush with social work and guidance candidates.  Here's how the interventionists are working out now and we feel:

JES:  2 part time Title I teachers, two KEIPS have added 2 hours to their schedules as interventionists, one FEIP added 2 hours as interventionist.

LES:  2 half time interventionists who are also KEIPS 4 KEIPs extending hourly rates, 2 part time Title I, one TItle I unfilled

MES, I full time interventionist

Ben Hem:  2 keips extending schedule, 1 PT person 4 hours a week, No title I teacher currently, down 4 paras

BES:  5 KEIPS extended hours, 2 full time people, 

 If that is the case,  I think it would benefit the committee to be updated on who is already part of the support and redirection when needed for kids.  

we have had 5 fires at NHS since April, mask breaks and teacher absences means we have no coverage--ever teacher is maxed out on duties already.  Many kids have hallway duty but we pull them for coverage of absent teachers.  Since the dining hall is used for classes right now (no space) we cannot send classes for absent teachers to the cafeteria as we have before (can only do 3 classes as 2 other classes are actually being held there for regular classes).  These 5 subs help us keep our staff in their duties, thus seeing kids in halls, bonding with them

documenting traffic, bathroom checks and the like.  Ensures safety so that vice principals and deans can do the counseling and intervention work they need to do behind closed doors.

Finally, what metrics are we going to use to determine the effectiveness and future needs of the positions with this grant funding. It is unclear to me right now how we are determining if our covid recovery plan is working the way we would like it to or if there are adjustments that we need to start considering now. I’m all for the flexibility that you are showing will be needed as we move through this. 

Ms. Brunell, you have been given the ESSER grant application as you requested and in it, there are many metrics noted for how we aim to address the use of the positions and their efficacy.  I am including it again here.  However, I would caution all of us to say that any one test can measure the effectiveness of these positions.   The intervention positions are directly tied to RTI tier 2 intervention plans (goal attainment plans) and I will be looking at the growth rates on renaissance learning assessments to see if we are addressing this need.

The RL suite also has progress monitoring assessments which are used (depending on the needs of the child) to track their impact.  Special Ed Reading tutors are being tracked through dyslexia screeners and reading screeners within the OG and Wilson curriculum.  Fundations curriculum work will also be reviewed.  

For NHS, we are tracking grades and common assessment data to determine the impact of the additional staff there.  At our School Zilla district training this past week (our data dashboard is being designed now for administrator use) the below data on grades was shared as an early indicator of 

the kind of progress we intended to make with added NHS staff.  The below graphic indicates the number of failing grades for students over the time period noted on the y axis.  We are still learning to use this dashboard, but we are tracking grades for all students grades 6-12, Renaissance learning in math and ELA K-9, common assessments across all grade levels, and for SEL, our student wellness data recently captured allows us to now recommend acute students for intervention.  Hence the executive functioning tutor recommendations noted in this meeting's 

information grades 5-8.  We have seen progress with at-risk students in grades 9-12 with the EF tutor and would like to replicate.  We are about to implement follow up assessments with a tool called the DESSA which will allow us to find further detail on key SEL needs for children who are flagged globally as at-risk by Panorama surveys.  All of these are discussed at building RTI meetings and we meet as principals and central office regularly to continue to report on trends so that we could make this mid-year revision to the requests.

Tomorrow, Thursday December 16th - 

The Policy Subcommittee Meets in person only.  1:00 p.m. Agenda here. 

• Bulk of the meeting will be the continued work on an Anti hate/Micro aggression policy. 
• Our previous meetings this month have been about the homework/test Holiday calendar.
• Interested in this work? How do we make our calendar more equitable and conscious of the population of students and staff within Natick? Feel free to contact me.
• Click here to review the process that Westborough, MA went through to consider a changes to their school calendar and homework/test policies around holidays.