This evenings school committee meeting was at best a difficult one.
There were a number of items under discussion. First, during Citizens Speak two of the co-chairs of Invest in Milton took the podium to advocate for an override. Julio Valera and Mary Ann Rule both spoke in support of the override to be voted on June 8th. The actual amount of that override will be determined at Town Meeting scheduled for May 4th and 5th (it could run over). The school administration has refined the candidate for school business administrator to two candidates: Samuel Rippen, Director of Finance for the Winchester Public Schools and Matthew Gilles (sp?) of the Carver school system. These two candidates were selected from over 25 applications, 8 of whom were interviewed. Committee Mary Kelly commended the administration on a “a great process and a model that should be continued.”
Next was a discussion on the need to open a job req for the principleship at the Tucker School. This is in light of the letter from the MSBA. Given that letter, the consensus is that school closings are not an option and this open position at Tucker needs to be posted. Chairman Lovely raised the possibility of Cunningham and Collicott sharing a principle while acknowledging it was a “lousy deal.”
By unanimous vote the school committee elected to freeze all non-union salaries in excess of $50K and restrict raises to non-union salaries less than $50K to 1%. Committee member Lynda Lee Sheridan stated it was a “painful decision to make.” Lovely emphasized that the motion would be in force independent of whether or not an override passed.
Jim Bowes was announced to be the new football coach. The school committee did not feel that Steve Traister could function as both coach and athletic director. All members acknowledged the fine job Traister has done over the last year.
And then Mary Gormley took the floor and gave a presentation on the impact a non-contingent budget would have on the schools. A non-contingent budget is one that does not take into account the passage of an override to Prop 2 1/2.
The presentation was blunt.
Absent passage of an override, according to Gormley, the school budget will be $31,313,982. To meet that budget, the school administration is recommending that 45.5 positions be eliminated as follows: 11 at the elementary schools, 11.5 at the middle school, 12.4 at the high school, 9 district wide, and 1.5 in administration.
Gormley broke down specifically what departments and at what level (elementary, middle, high) but the challenge they had to deal with was twofold: keeping all the schools open with such drastic cuts and continuing to staff the French Immersion Program.
A number of strategies were discussed including the “looping” of teachers (i.e. a teacher follows a class through consecutive years of study) – it made some observers loopy. The diminished staff coupled with the requirement to keep all the schools open results in a situation in which students could attend one school one year and a different school the next. Families could have their children in different schools at the same time.
At one point Gormley said there may only be 1 art teacher for 1100 students. When John Drottar, principal of Milton High School was asked what impact the cuts might have on college admissions, he was unequivocal, “This would be huge in terms of college acceptance . . .we will lose our competitive edge.”
Beirne Lovely, chairman of the committee, was clear in his assessment, ” this is major surgery to our schools . . . the attractiveness of Milton’s schools will be seriously diminished. . . and property values will be affected.”
The school administration said they would be making this evenings presentation available online.