Skip to main content

Recap from the Natick School Committee Meeting from 4/4/2022

Slide Deck here Pegasus Link here

Committee Reorganization:

Ms. Cathi Collins - Chair  (vote 6-0-1) 

Ms. Hayley Sonneborn - Vice Chair ( vote 6-0-1)

Dr. Donna McKenzie - Clerk ( vote 7-0-0) 


Ms. Catherine Brunell - Paraprofessional negotiations (appointed)

Mr. Shai Fuxman - Administrative Assistants negotiations (appointed) 


Our Re-organization will continue on 4/25 for subcommittees, advisory committees and liaison positions.  



Teaching and Learning Update    


Middle School Mid Year State of the Union Slides 


What is a Student Growth Percentile  (SGP) in lay persons terms?   Watch a video tutorial here.  

  • SGP is measurement of how much the student "grew" or learned between two points in time.

  • Much like the height charts you might see when you go to the pediatricians office. Instead of just learning how tall your child is, the doctor also looks to see if the child is growing at a consistent rate.  

  • The median of all of the SGP’s in the class becomes the Grade Level SGP

  • Dr. Nolin described that DESE recommends a median SGP between 40 and 60%. As such, Natick has chosen that as its goal for all students.

  • These next two charts show a big picture element for us to celebrate!




Natick High School Mid Year State of the Union Slides

- We will hear more about these observations in the coming months but I do want to draw your attention to a summary slide provided to our committee:  




Vote to Amend the Superintendent's Contract

The committee voted 6-1-0 to amend the Superintendent's contract for FY22. 


The vote allows the Superintendent to buy back an additional 10 vacation days this year. Per her contract before this amendment, Dr. Nolin receives 25 vacation days with the ability to buy back 10 and roll 5 over to the next year. With this amendment, for FY22 only she has the ability to buy back 20 days.  


To see the committee vote please see the meeting video here at minute 1:57:20.

Future Agenda Items Requested:

Changes to the map of the Johnson district
Student and Teacher Rep Involvement in our Committee
DEI on the School Committee





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