BERKSHIRE HILLS REGIONAL SCHOOL DISTRICT

Great Barrington    Stockbridge   West Stockbridge

JOINT MEETING:

BHRSD SCHOOL COMMITTEE MEETING  &  LEE SCHOOL COMMITTEE                                                                                                    SHARED SERVICES

LEE MIDDLE & HIGH SCHOOL – LIBRARY – 100 Greylock Street, Lee Massachusetts

7:00 p.m. – January 21, 2016

Present:

BHRSD School Committee:   S. Bannon, R. Bradway,  D. Weston, A. Potter, J. St. Peter, W.Fields, C. Shelton, F. Clark, R. Dohoney

BHRSD Administration:     P. Dillon, S. Harrison

LEE School Committee: Andrea Wadsworth, Al Skrocki (interim Superintendent), Robert Lohbauer, Susan Harding, Kathleen Hall, Loren Kinnaman, Kelly Koperek

LEE Administration:  Tiffany Morawiec

Staff: LEE: Greg Brighenti (HS Principal), Ann Consolati (Teachers Assoc President), Kate Russell (Middle School Principal), Andrea Larman (SPED director)

Absent: BHRSD: K. Piasecki

List of Documents Distributed:

January 21, 2016 agenda; Shared Services Document- created by a Lee SC and Lenox SC Sub-committee

RECORDER NOTE: Meeting being transcribed from recorded DVD provided by CTSB after the fact. Length of joint portion of meeting: 1hr 05min

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PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE 

The listing of agenda items are those reasonably anticipated by the chair, which may be discussed at the meeting. Not all items listed may in fact be discussed, and other items not listed may be brought up for discussion to the extent permitted by law. This meeting is being recorded by CTSB and will be broadcast at a later date. Minutes will be transcribed and made public, as well as added to our website, www.bhrsd.org once approved.

 

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CALL TO ORDER

Meeting to order @ 7:00pm Lee School Committee Superintendent

 

                                                                         AGENDA

Offer Shared Services between Lee and BHRSD:

Bannon: asked the BHRSD Collaborative Review Sub-Committee size (of 3 members) be fitted into the  Lee Shared Services document

Susan Harding: Purpose was not to have a quorum and that each side to have equal number of votes in that sub-committee. We could go to 3 without going to quorum because there is currently 7.

Robert Lohbauer: Our purpose is for the agreement to have a loose structure and the details are captured later in the individual contracts. This is a launching place.

Peter Dillon: #7 couple of repeated sentences. Requesting it just get cleaned up. And may make sense to add the Superintendent role in this.

Andrea Wadsworth: Union 29 is represented in the group and the requirement for Superintendent hire is met. FYI: Union formed with Tyringham with a sub-committee which is wholly tasked with hiring the superintendent.

F.Clark: Doc seems open ended enough to be flexible.

General consensus around the table was agreement with Fred’s comment.

Al Skrocki: Purpose of this document was as an ice-breaker and change mindset of districts and committees so that when a position is needed, first step is to collaborate not outside hire to fill the vacancy. Includes positions that don’t fall under collective bargaining agreements and purposefully did not include principals with Lenox to maintain individual identity in each district. Agreement designed to also be easily terminated if both districts agree allowing for alt options.

R.Dohoney makes motion to approve the agreement and to authorize Chairman Steve Bannon to sign and make edits discussed this evening.      Seconded:R.Bradway    Approved:Unanimously

 

Lee School Committee Unanimously Agreed to sign the agreement once edits are made.

 

Explore Cooperation of Facilities Management Needs:

Andrea Wadsworth: Food Service has been looked at with Lenox. Unsure what facilities looks like and are willing to map out or change look of if something Berkshire Hills wanted to entertain.

P.Dillon: Director of Operations in the Facilites role: Steve Soule. Highly competent and effective. Supports a team of three people who do maintenance. Mowing, plowing, manage our own wastewater treatment center, etc. Frank and Pete are fully licensed and Ron is a master carpenter.  Group of custodians that work across all three buildings overnight. Our building maintenance is remarkable and all three buildings. Steve has taken steps in creative thinking. School district and town of Great Barrington has entered into a contract with a solar panel company, anticipating a credit over the next thirty years somewhere between $70,000 and $90,000 on our electric bill. Steve is thoughtful and educated and there are some real possibilities there.  Next Step would be to get Lee and BHRSD facilities managers together and look at sharing of services.

Al Skrocki : Not being a district, Lee has a much smaller team  but they do have their person who acts in the same capacity as a facility director.

P.Dillon:  there may also be a possibility to cooperate with general maintenance; electrician or telephone technology service provider.

Al Skrocki: Would be best for both facility managers to get together and get a collective overview of an assessment for what needs to be done on a daily basis and also addressing short and long-term needs as they come up, aside from bidding out jobs. Assessing the total picture and matching it to the manpower of who’s doing what and seeing if there are some places where combining things can be done. If there’s an overlap into the collective bargaining group it can get a little complicated but looking at the big picture would be the appropriate first step.

R.Dohoney: We may also get better deals on technology and other services as we are a bigger customer base and can get a better price being a bigger customer.

Andrea Wadsworth:  On a fiscal level, it has been done in other schools where during the pilot period of this is a 50/50 split between both schools.

R.Bradway: Is a member of the buildings and grounds subcommittee, working with Steve every day, he is a very resourceful, educated, knowledgeable person.

Discuss Potential Sharing of Curriculum Coordination, Grant Writing and Data Support:

P.Dillon: Spoke of Joshua Briggs who is the Director of Learning & Teaching. In that role he works to support the principals and teachers and doing their work. BHRSD’s professional development is very thoughtful and very aligned. All of the professional development days are very structured and the teachers work on a curriculum through the software called Atlas. What is now wonderful is everything that we do is built on what came before.  There is lots of attention given to personal assessment and team assessment. The superintendent and the principles meet as an admin team every two weeks  with a particular Topic in mind and really dig into it – like how can we support our teachers, how can we get thoughtful feedback.  Joshua also writes the grants we apply for and through work we have received an $800,000+ grant that allows us to run a very robust after-school and summer extended program.

Al Skrocki: Doesn’t see the need for a Curriculum director but does see a place for a curriculum coordination at key times; each year or when new curriculum is being developed. Important to have a director or coordinator who knows what the teachers needs are on every grade level,  finding resources for teachers, being able to research the best textbooks, and being able to meet those needs of the teachers  and bring that to the teachers so that they can focus on teaching and less of the grunt work. This becomes an issue of necessity not of cost effectiveness So that the best education can be brought to the students. Doesn’t see that monies would be able to obtain a position for a curriculum director but it is definitely an area where sharing services would meet a need and be a benefit for Lee.

Andrea Wadsworth asks the school principals to comment:

Greg Brighenti (HS Principal): Sees a definite need for K-12 curriculum alignment.

Kate Russell (Middle School Principal):Person who can respond to a need a PLC ( Professional Learning Community ) has in a certain area in an efficient manner. Ex: When training is needed: setting up the classes and the “when and where” of it, or if research needs to be done about something the curriculum director could do that very quickly.

Andrea Larman (SPED director): Remarked on how this need is an ongoing conversation and a lot of the work mentioned is done by teachers on their own time, outside of school, creating an imbalance between personal//professional life.

Ann Consolati (Teachers Assoc President): Bulk of professional development has been for curriculum development and not on professional development like Technology training, Universal Design training, techniques for being an effective Teacher in the 21st century.

 

P.Dillon: With the Southern Berkshire Shared Services Project, we see that we have a lot to offer as a group of educators and that we really can contribute and help each other learn and develop in areas where we need it the most.

D.Weston: Southern Berkshire shared services project is trying to coordinate a professional development calendar, but even if it doesn’t, there’s no reason why we can’t coordinate our calendar for PD days.

S.Bannon: We all have the same focus, which is to focus on the kids and giving them the best education possible. If there is a cost benefit, that’s great but really it’s about the kids and their education.

Al Skrocki: We don’t have a grant writer. We talked about it and how a specific person for grant writing can expand our opportunity for grant success, we just never went anywhere with it because we don’t have the money in the budget for that position so we use our Business Admin and other staff as much as possible to write grants.

P.Dillon:  We see a need for data collection and analysis for the state and what they require from the schools regarding our performance in teaching and learning. Perhaps collaboration on that would be a good thing.

Andrea Wadsworth opens the discussion to anyone in either School Committee Boards:

W.Fields: Likes that we are talking students and not money but we have to be realist. There’s got to be a way that we can offer services that is good for the kids but is also fiscally reasonable. Especially in the SPED area because that is an enormous budget expense. And also to look at transportation contracts. People say, “We can’t afford this, what are you going to do different?” I see this as the answer where we are able to deliver a great education that is also fiscally responsible.

S.Bannon: Sees this as a door opening and hopes it is the first of many joint SC meetings.

Andrea Wadsworth: Thanked everyone for their time and effort in putting together such a meeting with so many people.

LEE motioned to adjourn from the joint meeting. Seconded. Approved Unanimously

A.Potter moved to adjourn meeting     Seconded:D.Weston     Approved: Unanimously

BHRSD portion of  meeting adjourned at 8:05pm

 

The next meeting is scheduled for January 28, 2016 –Du Bois Regional Middle School

 

Berkshire Hills Regional School District does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, sex, gender identity, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, disability, or homelessness.

 

Submitted by:

Rebecca Burcher, Recorder

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Rebecca Burcher, Recorder

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School Committee Secretary