Tuesday, August 28, 2007 – 7:00 PM
Roy Morrisette Alumni Room
Present: Sally Oxnard, Kris Magnusson, Ray Trueman, Lucy
Cushman, Kim Casey,
Patty Lovejoy, Townley Chisholm, Tomasen Carey and
Barbara Collins
Absent: N/A
Administration: Arthur
Hanson, Nathan Lunney, Victor Sokul, Tom O’Malley, Margaret
Callahan, Peter Stackhouse, Tony Baldasaro and Bill Perkins
1. CALL TO ORDER/PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE: Chair Oxnard called the meeting to order at 7:02 PM followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. Board members and administration introduced themselves.
2. NON-PUBLIC SESSION: None at this time.
3. ANNOUNCEMENTS/PUBLIC INPUT: John Hazekamp, Stratham spoke regarding the merging of the NWEA data. Townley Chisholm arrived. Superintendent asked Mr. Baldasaro to speak regarding the NWEA data and he responded that the data is already merged and instead of having 7 different districts, we now have all the data under SAU 16. Jackie Horgan, Newfields, mother of 7th grader and 12th grader who have both spent their entire school experience in SAU 16 shared her concern that the board is constantly being blasted on the front page of the newspaper and feels it is affecting parents/students and bringing negativity on teachers who are doing the best they can. Would like to see the board find a way to make changes better and more positive, without tearing things down. Kim Casey arrived.
4. CHAIR’S REPORT
4.1 Advisory Budget Committee – Nathan Lunney & Bobby Aldrich: Mr. Lunney explained background from March election for an ERCSD Budget Advisory Committee and that the committee has now elected a chair, Mr. Bobby Aldrich, who is present this evening. Mr. Aldrich reviewed status of the committee to date; hope board will have the Budget Advisory Committee present at their January Budget Retreat; hope to meet with board later in year to share information with board; will take site visit on October 19th to all programs we have been hearing about – Tuck Learning Campus entities, Exeter High School, Cooperative Middle School, and SST. Committee is meeting tomorrow night and would invite board members to attend if they are interested and hope to have a full schedule posted after tomorrow night sharing all their meetings dates for the remainder of the year. Mr. Lunney further noted that you can link from the SAU 16 Website to an ERCSD Budget Committee page where the meetings will be posted, along with the agendas and minutes that are maintained.
4.2 Discussion of Charter School Funding:
Superintendent noted that new legislation effective
July 2009 will require all students to stay in school until the age of 18, up
from age 16. This is causing many schools to look at alternatives for all high
school students such as our high school Alternative
School at EHS and the Great Bay eLearning Charter School, along
with the Adult Education program and the GED program. Mr. Lunney gave
background information on the EHS Alternative
School program that has been in
existence for 7 years, is housed at the Tuck Learning Campus (TLC), will open
with 30 students this year and explained that these are all EHS students who
receive the same services as a student at EHS. This program serves to keep
these high risk students in school and from a cost perspective in SY 07-08 is running
around $400,000 for the program (not including overhead costs such as heat,
lights, etc.) which is about $13,000 per student/per year. About 60% of these
students have I.E.P.’s (Individual Education Programs), all teachers have to be
“highly qualified,” and current student to teacher ratio is about 7/1. We
could correlate the success of the school being based on the small ratio of
students to staff. Chair noted that this program addresses any goals we have
on drop-out prevention.
Mr. Lunney then discussed Great Bay eLearning Charter School (GBeCS) and background law on charter school noting GBeCS was granted one of first charters in July 2004. Reviewed SPED responsibility for out of district students, transportation requirements in a charter school and funding of charter schools. GBeCS secured over $700,000 in start-up grants and opened in January 2005 with 9th graders who the next year became 10th graders which allowed the school to incur new start-up costs. School is based on a project based learning environment that is technology rich and offers our students another alternative learning environment. Currently have a 15/1 student to teacher ratio, two Coop Board member sit on Board of Trustees, and current budget is about $191,000 for teacher salaries and around $100,000 for benefits for those teachers for about a $300,000 total cost that is on the ERCSD contracts. This is an independent school that will grant their own diplomas this year as their first set of students graduate. Cost per pupil is a little under $7,000/student and school for first time has its own set of books and will be completing state reporting on the school. Mr. Lunney is currently working to identify some of the carrying cost so can offer a more concise per pupil cost breakdown in the future. Current EHS student are around $11,000/student per year. For the out of district student at GBeCS, the state will send about $4,000/student per year and if any student has SPED needs, the sending district has to incur 100% of those services. Board member noted that the board should be commended for their support of the school so staff/parents are not spending their time fundraising as other charter schools have had to do.
4.3 Issue School Board Meeting Date Calendar: Correction to list – the Thursday, January 20th date should be January 17th; Superintendent reminded board that the first SAU Joint Board meeting on September 17th is at the Seacoast Professional Development Center since there is a tour of the TLC campus prior to the meeting.
5. SUPERINTENDENT/ADMINISTRATION REPORT
5.1 Proposal by CMS Administration on Honors Math: Superintendent called on Mr. O’Malley and his staff to present on the honors math proposal. Mr. O’Malley explained that this was in response to the board’s direction at the June meeting and that he and the administration have worked over the summer, without benefit of staff, to create an honors math with heavy emphasis on pre-engineering. He passed out a handout titled “Response to Honors Program” that read: To implement a “pre-engineering” math course that is a challenging, project-based, collaborative learning experience designed specifically for the multi-age middle school classroom. This will serve as a supplemental opportunity for students who wish to be introduced to the engineering profession and actively involved in the process of team investigation, design, problem-solving, decision-making and oral presentation. The real world project topics chosen and explored will fall within the context of the New Hampshire Mathematics Standards for grades six through eight. Discussion followed on the logistics involved for a student to take this course, noting it would not replace regular math course, but could take as an additional math course. Due to problems staffing the world language option for incoming 6th graders, currently the course does not have a teacher. CMS administration discussed the unknowns with this proposal - have not decided what to do if not enough are enrolled in it OR if too many want to take the course; another unknown is how it will impact the programs that are already in place, especially if they need so many students in them (band, chorus, world language). Mr. O’Malley added that since today is the first day of school for staff, teachers are just finding out about this proposal today. The 6th grade World Language exploration would have only been 28 days of class so it would be a very small sample of world language time. Board members shared their thoughts on the program and Mr. O’Malley explained that if this proposal were approved tonight, it would begin as soon as possible and it is his sense that those students who have elected to be in chorus and band, would probably continue in those classes. Motion by Ms. Lovejoy, seconded by Ms. Collins to adopt this Honors Program as presented. Discussion followed on concern that program has been put together too quickly without staff input, etc. With no further discussion, chair called for a vote: Yes 2 (Lovejoy, Collins), No 6 (chair did not vote) motion failed. Board members are to email Ms. Collins regarding any additional information they would like from CMS administration to continue discussion on this proposed honors program.
5.2 Principals’ Reports: Mr. O’Malley deferred
to Mr. Baldasaro for the CMS Principals’ report. Mr. Baldasaro shared the CMS
AYP (Average Yearly Progress) results with the board in a clip entitled “Did
you Know” and shared an AYP Handout from NHDOE (see Attachments
#1 pdf and
#1A pdf).
All categories made AYP at CMS this year. EHS Principal Sokul shared two handouts:
1) sheet of general EHS information for board (see
Attachment #2 pdf) and a sports
banner he has ordered for each sport that will hang in the gym and 2) shared the
Advance Placement course results for last couple of years (see
Attachment #3
pdf).
Board member request to show previous years results with Calculus 100, World
History 100 and Biology II 100. Mr. Sokul will also check if Kate Wheeler
Smith was 2006 AP English Lit teacher.
SST Principal Callahan noted she was asked to give an update on the renovations
of SST which she explained is occurring in 4 phases: 1) new driveway which is a
4 weeks project; 2) Early Childhood Education will be the first program
finished and should be ready in early October; 3) automotive 13,000 sq ft shop
with bays has had foundation poured and is moving very well; 4) Health Sciences
and Technology program is ahead of schedule with their renovation and should be
finished before the holidays. SST is welcoming 650 students tomorrow which is
largest enrollment ever. Additionally, the maintenance shed foundation work is
ahead of schedule so it will be ready for Ben Gerkin’s students to begin work
on it immediately and she thanked the board for their support on this since the
maintenance shed will also be the classroom area for the Building Trades
students.
5.3 Financial Report – Nathan Lunney: Mr. Lunney shared explanations on the following financial sheets: 1) Blue sheet is Education Funding Analysis (see Attachment #4 pdf): tan sheet is “Summary of District Capital Debt” (see Attachment #5 pdf); green sheet is “Account Summary of Trust Funds” (see Attachment # 6 pdf); and yellow sheet is “FY 2006-07 Revenue Projection” (see Attachment #7 pdf); and purple sheet is “2006-07 Fund Balance Summary” (see Attachment #8 pdf).
5.4 Summer Maintenance Projects – Dick Wendell: Superintendent expressed his sincere appreciation to Dick Wendell and his Assistant Director Ed Oddo for all their work this summer in moving all entities to TLC along with all completing their summer maintenance projects. Mr. Wendell updated board on some of his summer projects: move of SAU Offices, Brentwood (an additional maintenance district that is subbed out to Mr. Wendell’s crew) has a new security entrance; Exeter elementary schools have new security measures in place at their entrances; and CMS front entrance enhancement with security devices along with 50 classrooms had the door locks changed in a door lock phasing in project Mr. Wendell welcomed and thanked Mr. Jim Fellows, our new theater coordinator and is now overseeing the taping of the Coop Board meetings, for all his work and also thanked Mr. Ed Oddo for all his work in trying to close out the new high school project.
5.5 SAU Administrative Retreat: Superintended reported that the retreat went quite well with the first day having a SPED attorney discussing SPED and how it relates in regular education and the second day of the retreat was run by Assistant Superintendent Steve Kossakoski and dealt with technology.
5.6 Nominations and Resignations: Superintendent passed out an ERCSD – New Hires (since June 19, 2007 (see Attachment # 9 pdf) and noted that two names need to be removed from that sheet - CMS Marquita Maciolek and SST Vidhya Bhat since board had previously approved these two. He would recommend the board accept this list of New Hires as well as the Fall Appointments (see Attachment #10 pdf) that were in your packet. Motion by Ms. Lovejoy, seconded by Ms. Casey and unanimously board voted with no discussion to accept both the New Hires and the Fall Nominations as presented.
6. COMMITTEE REPORTS: Due to time constraints, the
Chair noted that all remaining reports, except for the Superintendent Search
Committee update, will be deferred until the
September 11, 2007 board meeting.
6.1 Special Survey Committee Report – met August 23, 2007 - deferred
6.2 SAU Superintendent Search Committee Report – Townley Chisholm: He has missed a number of meetings, but had updated information to share: committee has accomplished coming to consensus on information that has now been posted on the SAU 16 Website on superintendent characteristics, actual ad, profile of SAU 16 towns, etc.; NESDEC will accept applications and NHSBA will post ad on their website; developed brochure and postcards to potential candidates (400); committee will meet again tomorrow night at 7:00 PM at the SAU Office.
6.3 SAU 16 Technology Committee – next meeting September 28, 2007 – no report.
6.4 SAU 16 Policy Committee – next meeting September 6, 2007 – no report.
Policies for First Reading - deferred
A. GBGBA – Use of Automated External Defibrillators
B. IMG – Animals in School
C. JLCH – Do Not Resuscitate Orders
D. KDC-R – Website Publishing Policy
Policy for Review – JEB – Age of Entrance - deferred
6.5 SAU 16 Chairs – next meeting August 29, 2007 – no report
6.6 SST Governing Board – met August 27, 2007 – Ray Trueman - deferred
6.7 Great Bay eLearning Charter School – met August 16, 2007 – Lucy Cushman/Patty Lovejoy - deferred
Ms. Collins spoke on triple EEE and noted Kensington was sprayed; Mr. Wendell reported that EHS and CMS have been sprayed as well as SMS and Brentwood and possibly only EK has not been sprayed.
7. APPROVAL OF MINUTES
7.1 June 19, 2007 - deferred
8. NON-PUBLIC SESSION: None at this time.
9. ADJOURNMENT: Motion by Ms. Casey, seconded by Ms. Magnusson and unanimously board voted with no discussion to adjourn at 9:42 PM.
Respectfully submitted,
Sally S. Boyd, Secretary