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Marlborough School Board Emergency Meeting for October 19, 2020

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Meeting Date, Time: Monday, October 19, 2020 – 6:00 PM Meeting Location: The Marlborough School Board members attended the meeting remotely. The closed captioning is not necessarily reflective of the true words spoken during this meeting.

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soon as it begins the meeting is yours sir right I say the red light blinking so I will call the meeting to order first item on the agenda is approval of minutes we have both public and non-public minutes to proof and I'll entertain a motion following which we can have any discussion if people I have Corrections or other edits to suggest recommend to be improved got a second okay so it's been moved and seconded that we approve the public in the non-public minutes from our meeting up number 26 or 28 28 are there any discussion about those minutes okay hearing on John would you mind calling the roll mr. Bemis mr. Miller Brett thank you where'd everybody go I will document Grace I just put the agenda up so that you know everybody who might not have that in at least can see what we're doing sir okay thank you the next item is to approve the bills and manifests we've I think I got copies and we sign those as requested so I'm going to move that we have the bills and manifests as sent To Us by the essay you this past week second thank you Mark any questions or comments about any the line items on any of the bills and manifest I know Scott is fully prepared to answer them hearing none I think we can call the roll in the bills and manifest mr. Bean hi mr. fella Guerra mr. Miller super-sol on the agenda the next item is public input followed by reports from the business manager the principal and the superintendent my suggestion is that and I am happy to be overruled by my fellow board members that we reversed order so that the public have a chance to listen to the reports first before the public input session it may either answer some questions or spark some questions because that be okay I see not okay so Scott I know you were hoping for a little break here but you're wrong all right so can you hear me yes all right good evening everyone else turn off with my standard October's filled that October is our first forward-looking financial report of the 2020-2021 school year you know every September is the end of your clothes out where we go over exactly where we finish the prior-year and now October we are looking forward to the next year financial report today is complete minus the final numbers for salary and benefits as we are still compiling all of the changes to benefit select and Staffing changes and I'm working on those this week so we will have the true salary and benefits budget impacts and November's business report this monthly rent Hernandez budgeted we start at the top with our revenues that again everything is entered as budgeted at this time the only difference is that we did have an unreserved fund balance of $89,500 $71 and if you'll recall up leading up into that we actually had been projecting a small deficit of $25,000 in the board had move to use funds from the special education tuition trust funds if necessary to cover that deficit thankfully we did not need to do that and we ended due to cost savings from Cove in with a small surplus of $89,000 moving down to our expenses you're going to see that we have already got some significant deviations from budget will start with the first large one which is Gene High School regular to at this point in time I'd be the same mostly due to covid-19 we have significantly fewer Keene High School regular I'd tuition so we have projected Surplus in that line of $87,486 hour special instruction line as you can see has the deficit of 83019. and that is based mostly on unanticipated out-of-district placements Keene high school special education online is a deficit of one tuition so we are one above Budget on that line item summer school we have a $5,600 surplus projected the next major fridge is speech services and we have had to contract for speech services or a three-month time. Because we're unable to find a long-term substitute soul that cost puts us at $46,793 over budget I'm going to ask Rob if you could scroll us down a little further thank you all right looking at the other major discrepancies from budget at this point Building Services were about $1,500 over budget is for a repair shop somewhere with you to come inside were just regular repairs that needed to be done which was slightly over budget at this point the info management LG shows a $21,000. that is incorrect I've looked into that in that was the least payment for our computers that we purchased and budgeted properly. Was taken out of the wrong so I have to get with the accounts payable and just get that apply to the correct account following that down that leaves us with a projected deficit 90 1577 but after we correct the amount taken out of the wrong account info management technology that will be roughly $70,000 in deficit projected at this time primarily due to out-of-district tuition and unanticipated contractual services for speech services detailed questions at this time I'll be happy to answer those unanticipated out-of-district cost we're children who moved in over the summer already in placements is Scott is this your best projection of what's going to happen throughout the year when we look at Ro Bridge again very very early to be looking at year-end as we all know the biggest changes our intuition right now and it is extremely fluid students move in unexpectedly they can move out unexpectedly other situations like he look at like speech services staff development Media Services a lot of those accounts are all at zero the reason being is we we have money budgeted for line items in there that may or may not be used as you saw in the year-end report but at this early juncture I assume that every dollar did will be used as intended so there could very well be additional funds freed up by the end of the year and many of those lines as well as student enrollment can change massively I believe it last December we saw I think you can Rob and correct me if I'm off on the spot like a change in enrollment by 12 students I think they were all moving but it was to tell in between Thanksgiving and Christmas we had 12 new students yes so if it's extremely variable it could go either way so at this point we're just going to watch the budget and as we get further into the year we may need to make some changes made free some lines but this time it's a little early to get that drastic okay thank you any other questions no questions Scott can you hear me I can hear you all good cuz I'm I'm losing my intern and I was worried nobody cocci so I think I don't I haven't heard any questions so I'm going to move to accept the business managers financial report is that required yes yes so do I have a second second any discussion so I think we need to call the roll on moving to accept the finance report thank you Bemis mr. felger mr. Miller thank you next is the town tuition rate and I know there was a document in the drive reviewing the calculation for the town tuition rate Okay so as if everyone had a chance to see it okay so this is the annual tuition we create this based off all the state per-pupil cost calculation for elementary school in this is based off of all of our end-of-year numbers plug directly 25 in what does looks to do with isolate cost specifically to educating students in the Marlborough Elementary School so this Kohl's lines for things like high school cost transportation for field trips are co-curricular or really trying to identify just the funds used to educate children in the mall girl school ID then takes that calculation and uses the average daily membership of the past year and creates a tuition rate if we look at the tuition rate this year comes out to $20,800 and I believe it's 50 it's kind of hidden behind my 5757 which is an increase of 2150 $7 over last year's tuition rate of 18700 the reason behind us as you can see the far left the expenses went up $74,061 over last year in total what are average daily membership went down by 14.75 students so the major decrease in Daily members really increases the cost pupil and that's why we saw such a large change and that sets the tuition rate for the states purposes at $20,857 now the board to be there I adopt this as their tuition or they can increase or decrease it at their pleasure well first time that I've been called on to to do this and it's probably new to most of the I would think it would be fine and normal to accept that tuition rate as calculated you would be correct okay so I'm going to move to accept it but then open for discussion so my fellow board members if you have a different idea that would then be the time to weigh in and we're totally good to talk about it and I will defer to another recommendation if there is one so I'm going to move that we accept the town tuition rate as calculated by business manager Scott Lazaro second at the motion has been moved and seconded Jen would you know sorry we're now it's on the table could so any discussion or questions for Scott around this and Scott I don't I don't want to get this wrong so I'm guessing that I should better be a short or long list of students who would like to come to Marlboro from out of town this is what we would charge for tuition other than any exceptions that we wish to make is that correct okay would there be any benefits or not to raising or lowering definition right I can't think of anybody to be honest all the districts except for Nelson and just accept this formula as their tuition rate they actually have separate calculation that they've been doing for a long time between the two but you don't see a benefit to doing I guess if we were trying to pack the school and there were families from outside the district who would like to pay to come to Marlborough but don't want to pay the full tuition since most of our expenses are fixed we might then move to adopt the lower tuition because it's pretty much all ink I'll Revenue to us but I don't really think that's the situation for our designs other districts who had in previous years had lower than ideal populations have created policies that have allowed private paying families to pay a lower rate but that was a separate policy for private families and they still adopt their standard wishing for other districts paying to have kids come to the school so that would be something if you wanted to do that you would want to create a private pay okay the definition with the District placements is that what you mean by other schools and have their kids come to our school with geography some school of our outlying towns actually have students who fall into another District but it's cheaper and easier for them to pay the tuition for them to go to one of our schools versus trying to get Transportation provided to those children and get them back to their own any other questions or comments Mark Kasper Andrew okay Jennifer would you mind call mr. Bemis mr. felguera mr. Miller okay the eyes have it principal Whitney it's all yours okay it shows attendance is pretty much the same as it was one change and student our goal to be we have not had many meeting time to work on the boat yet this year but that's coming up very quickly Jeff you would asked us to bruising some data so that's what I've done in the next section compliance with the universal plan for Atlanta and keeping fully distance we're having no problems really with the k-25 student we're having a great deal of problems with the middle school students they are pushing back pretty hard on the map and keeping their distance from each other and not wanting to run in touch each other and hug each other and push each other and so we're really having a tough time we are calling parents we have sent a couple of kids home who are just refusing to keep their on or we're having problems where a student will say I'm taking a drink I have my math class I can take the drink you shouldn't be taking the drink for 45 minutes so we're we're really working hard with some kids to get them to understand that is not optional in order to be in school they have to wear the masks we are doing a really good job that you're doing a really good job of getting the kids outside getting them  brakes getting the brakes and it's it's working but we do have to continue to work with those students who are are pushing them the compliance with the daily screener we are doing much much better than we were we were had less than 50% are we started who were completing it we now have a 4 to 6 today we have three children not completed so that number there is really really going up people are taking it seriously and they're doing it the behavior update probably no surprise so the mask you know we started the years saying we want 100% compliance the science was pretty good around the reasons for wearing a mask which a little to do with protecting the wearer and it has a lot to do with protecting everyone around the person wearing the mask me we all know this our faculty and staff are wearing masks most of the students are wearing masks and if you know it seems like we are suffering start of from some tyranny of the minority here so my question is what is the level of escalation available to us with what we refer to in your report as habitual offenders so sending them home for the day does not seem to have worked does suggesting that one of the consequences might be that they just need to go fully remote for their educational format is that possible because we're in a we are 5 weeks into the school year and I feel like we're despite our low numbers I don't want to be roulette with the safety of rest of the population at the school my recollection is at the SAU was quite firm in expecting 100% compliance on mask-wearing if a child is going to attend school that's correct and that's that's what you also approved when you approve the plan for the school and you know if if if they're not going to comply with Edward Robin and in the team are working with individual families if they're not going to take it serious and we're going to have to find alternatives for them to get their education because they can't be the ones we're putting others at that  dangerous you know quite frankly that's not acceptable you know it's not about whether you want to wear a mask or don't want to wear a mask it's not about it protecting you it's about you not animating or spreading your germs. during a pandemic that is without a doubt one of the two most important things that we have repeatedly heard from Health officials nope at the state level and at the national level distancing and masking are the do most effective measure that we can take so the science that you talk about Jeff is very clear about this I'll minutes not a negotiable I mean it really isn't in alimony and Robin when you say that you know you're having some difficulties in the middle school you're not talking 50% of your middle schoolers who are going crazy on this you're talking about a small percentage of students that are just acting like Middle School homeschoolers tend to do from time to time that need to be redirected into following what the school expectations are and what other parents are expecting to be taking place in the building when they and their kids are everyday so you're right the position at that we've taken and in our recommendations with a comprehensive plan is that everyone wears a mask you know that's that's it bottom line Robin are you tracking and recording how many times on Sunday certain kids refuse to wear their mouth you have like a threshold you know where okay you know you reached this point evolved in refute all that you do be considered to stay home and do school remotely is that what you have the policy we don't have an exact number now how do you make the policy that students are required to wear masks to be in the school for not wearing their masks and I don't think we want them in the school and it doesn't mean I don't mind going home for the day I mean going home and they can go to the remote model we're going to weigh fortunate we have that as an option for us what would prevent us and implementing that as a policy with prior notification to parents so maybe parents will get the message that their life as usual which racing would be okay with is not going to continue and then we're going to err on the side of health and safety before our staff and the majority of the students are behaving can can the board get an update on actions planned so that I don't want to be having this conversation at the next school board meeting so can we can we free that something will be done so that the goal is that either we would not have a minority of students causing majority of the problems endangering the culture of the school Health and Welfare of the school we will send you after robbing a night we will send you you and and Robin update of what the next steps are write thank you you guys are unbelievably patient and dedicated okay you asked about attendance attendance is going fine we haven't had any issues with a remote students or with our in-person we've had some kids we've been out for 10 days and that's because I've had the jump symptoms and not received a test so they have been out and we work with those families to get the students their work and get them caught up as soon as they come back so we're really not an attendance issue at all assessment we are doing we are completing our aimsweb testing and our New Hampshire SAS in from testing began today and that should be wrapped up by next Thursday so we will have more data and information on assessment next month November agenda excellent great house is coming up will open house so people will be able to visit it whenever they want to the teachers are putting together short videos and reducing their classrooms and their expectation and they're being posted to our webpage so parents will be able to go on and view open house whenever they lie I'll be completed by the end of the month thank you questions for principal Whitney ever open house the open house but they will be for parent-teacher conferences yes thank you Robin I know you're you're between a rock and a hard place and the board I will I won't speak for the rest of the board but I'm more than happy to be one of the bad guys if that's helpful and you changing tactics with families the board I think I'm getting the tenor from the board that the board will be Port of absolutely thank you are just want to be careful we're not sending kids home that have these high number of incidences that aren't Mass related unless they break enough rules that they deserve to go home Rob is there anything that you wanted to add to your report so that we can maybe get your reports to know every week any breaking news everything good so you get him every Monday and sometimes more often you know as merited then you know will continue to keep doing that you know moving forward but I don't really have any breaking so if there are any questions that I might be able to clear out by you would have seen in today's update there were some concerns about some folks were making the assumption that are screening and are stay-at-home didn't match Public Health guidance but it absolutely does our nurses are meeting every every Wednesday we're meeting with our nurses are administrators or meeting every Wednesday and you know that that's tricky for Marlboro because there you are fully on-site on Wednesdays but they're doing their best to be able to participate in those meetings, it was the time that works best for the majority of people and they are coming in participating as much possible if not then they are reviewing the notes from the discussion the discussions allow us to stay ahead of situations primarily focused on covet but all things inclusive as well and so I will continue with those meeting structures and I just want to reaffirm that our screening assessment in are stay-at-home requirement do absolutely match Public Health recommendations I found some of the issues are that there are multiple documents that exist in the in the in the hemisphere of New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services that contradict one another within their own website and you know we point them out to him and they say no please make sure you're using our most updated document which we do and we have conversations with dr. Chan every Wednesday afternoon this is after Meadows as administrators and nurses to make sure that our concerns are being brought to Public Health to the to the head of our State Health Organization and just wanted to be very clear with today's update because there were concerns we weren't even following what you know Public Health New Hampshire Public Health was saying that couldn't be further from the truth then I think our nurses and our principles are very well aware of that we put a lot of time an effort to make sure we are complying with their recommendations and their guidance it on just wanted to be very clear about that so thanks Rob thanks for the clarity was a good anybody Reddick couldn't look at that message so good to keep people in the same place thanks are there any committee reports tonight oh Jeff you got one I do guess you made it with the SAU compensation committee you have another meeting this Friday right so tell me about the content of that meeting over the appropriate to report that I can report that the are you staff I think has done an outstanding job of researching what is happening in the market or the people that work for the SAU office looking at both positions and individuals and history it was my first time attending a compensation committee and I was very impressed with the professionalism there is a calendar laid out that is realistic not too aggressive for getting us to the point making specific recommendations as a collective compensation committee for for follow-up consideration we have another meeting this Friday night very impressed with a Friday night I know every night every other night of the week is full for you poor people from the SAU so I'll good they're not expecting any big surprises I can comment on now is the process which is it's a really good process and I appreciate all the work that went into it and look forward to continuing to be a part of it thanks Jeff okay public input we normally set a time limit but we can vary the time limit so let's just open it up and assume it'll be 10 minutes but more than happy to make that longer if it looks like it's valuable so I guess we're all members of the public but in this we mean the non SAU an onboard public if you guys have a question or a comment go ahead I just have one quick question so talking about going some of those students in the middle school going remote possibly is the Key Middle School still an option for that being that  in the middle of the semester or middle of a trimester could be definitely could be an option we would have to have a conversation with the depending on what grade the student might be you know I definitely could be an option so we have to look at the numbers that they have for remote students you know cuz as you know even one could tip the scale drastically so no it would be in school so if that's not an option then we can t put that out there on the table so we would look through all of the very real options and make sure we're mindful of that whether it is over at Key Middle School or somewhere else or velox dually enrolled right right perfect thank you anything else from anyone well then I think the 10 minutes is up I love that you guys are so great and keeping us some time there so I just checking one more time we're good okay so the next item is old business the title 9 sexual harassment policy and grievance procedure so you remember we had this last month we wanted to bring it back you know because it's only 16 pages long and we didn't want you to have to go through through that in a short. Of time so we figured that we will bring it back to make those updates you'll see some of the language it's been underlying so that you know where recommendations have been made from where the policy was when you approved it in August initially so that we were in compliance with the office of Eunice office of civil rights I believe and it is now ready for your consideration so I will make a motion and we got to see it'll be the opportunity for anyone to ask questions or make any suggestions so I will move that the Marlborough School Board adopt the timeline sexual harassment policy women's procedure as distributed to the board prior to this meeting American okay thank you Mark any any discussion or questions from the board on page 11 all disclosure was only able to have only skimmed it it's not completely chew on it although there is no I'm here I'm here screen pajak the paragraph that starts although there is no time limit per say goes on to say to filing a formal complaint for complaints initiated by the complainant for his or her parent or Guardian employment must be employed by the for participating in or attempting to participate in the education program for activities of the district at the time of filing to me that says my daughter has an example she was sexually harassed in fourth grade and never had the courage to come forward until she was 20 years old which I think is not an uncommon and she's no longer a student she has no right to make a complaint anymore is that I read that especially bad teacher I'm trying to find where you're where you're reading Angel of Darkness PDF first paragraph larger paragraph from the bottom is sunk at 3 a I think you're looking at the wrong knockout which one are we looking at it and I don't think it so I don't think it's the wrong. I don't think it's the clean version that Rob is so he's a paid numbers might be off okay what's the Andy title for Title 9 grievance process What's the title of the section you looking at should be a process for filing a formal complaint sexual harassment is there a number or letter that corresponds with it 3A Roman numeral 3 I might be going well I just went by melt dismissal of a formal complaint so I did go buy some right before that right before this yes. It would be for the dismissal cuz I actually had him alright let me let me let me look for that so I'm not making everybody motion sick I'll see if I can what's the one you're looking at it's the one that's actually linked on your agenda so what we what we've done is we've put all the relevant documents we've linked them on the agenda Breeze for the public to be able to look at him as well Rob what's our deadline for taking action on this we can kick it down another month that's for sure yeah I just think that would be more probably more will have a better more quality quality conversation and Andrew Andrew if you could if you could reach out like at Lake anytime when you have questions about policy and you you're wondering about them you don't have to wait until the board meeting just Apison email and will prepare a response for you ahead of time so that we're not running through a very large document trying to find that information little bit trickier when we're meeting virtually and we'll be happy to respond in writing ahead of time and make sure that the entire board hears that response as well have a great yeah and every thanks for reading through it and finding something this is good and makes it good for me I just believe this is Donnie will talk about this again at the November meeting and those two questions or three questions or however many you have I don't have to be two or three or whatever if you've got 20 questions and those and not a problem okay so we'll defer action on this till November new business is acceptance of Hannaford helps schools gift there was a document put on the drive to picture of a brief document from Hannaford's explaining the program doesn't sound like a man that's where we do our grocery shopping or anything else it's nothing but upside is there a gift Pacific gift we are given Robin do you have that total no I don't I don't know what it is got DUI that total for Marlboro so just a question this is a gift this is from this is already been we did not have them we don't have the number but we know that it is coming if we approve the receipt of the gift right and it's in cash not Twinkies yes it's correct so basically what this is is when folks do shop do their shopping at Hannaford's they have a. Of time where you can take your receipt and put it into like a folder for the school you want a percentage of your total receipt to receive cash I'm so it's really a cash donation to the school based on the total number of receipts and total value of the receipts that they pay back toward to school and some people go in they get there as they go over to the middle it's kind of like a oh yeah the number of sales went into your thing and they give a percentage of it to the school so I don't know if Scott do you have a number for for the school so the documentation dollars but I was told that there is more than one check and the other amount is not listed on the documentation I was provided right so why don't I make a motion that the Marlboro School Board Marlborough School except gifts from the Hannaford helps schools program that works Diablo II anyone want to discuss this we exchanged the money for twinkies Jeff hi this is public we'll talk about that in non-public he's just getting stopped typing okay I think we can call the roll on this one Jennifer thank you after Christopher legare hi honey. I don't know if you want to disable it for withdrawals emotions I still have an open roast beef withdraw the motion that way were we can start fresh next month as well right guess what's wrong my second thanks for keeping us straight is there any other business okay is there been any changes to the Future agenda list which is very helpful by the way thank you are there any changes that we want to pay attention to from the last meeting is that the same list I'm sorry I didn't go back and compare so the only thing that we said we were going to talk about the aimsweb results the SAS results in November right then that earlier in this meeting it would that be a separate agenda item are just part of the principals report well it could be part of the principles report unless you decided to make it a separate agenda item given everything that's going on in the in the woods with covid and remote in the schools are yeah I think that warrants a a separate special mention so let's let's do that thank you no problem so let me build the agenda with his cancel that we're going to keep that at least that in the minutes okay I'm going to sew in a minute or less than a minute I'm going to move that we going to public session services for the benefit of the members of the public who have hung in there so far for this meeting following the non-public session we will come back into public session as I said last month which is true again this month we have no plans to discuss anything in the public session when we come back but you are free to hang around until that happens War because once we going to non-public we will no longer be on this call unless you're all off the call don't have to dial again so I'm going to move that we had turn on public session for RSA 9 183 do I have a second circumspect okay can we call the roll on entering non-public XFL Agera mr. Miller okay Rob do we have the dial and instruct for non-public so yes and it doesn't it doesn't look like everyone has left we still have a couple folks from the Publix here oh wait wait just a minute so what I'll do is I'll pause the recording okay we're now back in public session so before I just blurted out that the meeting is adjourned before about two things first I want to suggest that Rob blow the candles out of those jack-o'-lanterns before he leaves his office and second I want to ask the rest of the board if you have anything else you want to bring up before the have a meeting I would just like to thank Robin for her report make your own very helpful thank you okay good job of the foliage Rob all right I will declare the meeting adjourned thank you very much have a good night everyone likes everybody

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Marlborough School Board Emergency Meeting for October 19, 2020

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