Importance of Kindergarten registration

As a follow-up to the announcement here yesterday on the Kindergarten registration scheduled for next week, I received this letter from a Franklin parent:

I was at my school's PCC meeting and one piece of information that I did not realize was that the registration for Kindergarten in February helps determine the staffing of the Kindergarten teachers for the next year. Even if a parent is not sure if the child is going to the public school they should register them in February and then if they change their mind let the school know. From my understanding what happened last year is many students were not enrolled by their parents until July so it brought the counts in the class to 25 students.

It would be helpful for parents just starting the school process to understand why they need to register their child in February even if they are not 100% sure that is where they are going to get a better grasp of staffing needed for the next school year. Of course a class might still be this large if they cut kindergarten teachers in the budget but the forecast of how many teachers are needed is not truly shown in the February registration statistics if we have such a large number of parents registering in July.

It was also discussed at the School Committee meeting Tuesday evening that full-day kindergarten is desired, expected, a goal but is not guaranteed at this time due to the uncertainties in the budget.

Stay tuned for updates on the budget as the situation develops over the next couple of months.

Let me restate what I wrote earlier this week (bold added for emphasis):

In summary, the next several months can be very interactive. Franklin citizens can provide their input to the charter, the downtown project, and ultimately the Franklin budget. If you were waiting for a good time to get involved, the time is now.

Kindergarten registration information can be found here
http://franklinmatters.blogspot.com/2010/01/franklin-ma-kindergarten-registration.html

School Committee Mtg 01/26/10

The collection of posts that were reported live from the School Committee on Tuesday Jan 26, 2010 can be found here:

• Live reporting - closing items
• Live reporting - Superintendent
• Live reporting - action items
• Live reporting - Discussion only items
• Live reporting - Q&A - Preliminary budget discussi...
• Live reporting - FY 2011 Preliminary Budget Discus...
• Live reporting - FHS London Trip
• Live reporting - Sidewalk Snow Removal Presentatio...
• Live reporting - School Committee  

Live reporting - closing items

Subcommittee reports
We have a proposal to establish email addresses for the committee members. Can proceed with that one. Need clarification on the option of a group mailbox.

The Building Committee interviewed on the 13th of Jan the finalists for the Owners Project Manager (OPM). The selection Daedelus (sic) will be entering into contract negotiations, they have been involved with our prior major Franklin projects.


New business
Q - is full day kindergarten on or not?
A - if we get the full service budget of 53.5 we expect to have a full day kindergarten
At this point it is a desire, an expectation, a goal but it cannot be counted on.


Roy and Sabolinski to attend the Rotary Club

motion to enter executive session, roll call vote, passed 7-0

Live reporting - Superintendent

5. Information Matters

Superintendent’s Report
a. Finance Workshop Training
 well attended last night by Town Council, FinCom and a couple of residents

b. MSBA/FHS Project
looking to clarify the request and provide the data

c. Kindergarten Registration
forms available on the website

d. MASBO Compensation Study

e. Data Team
instructional data team working to understand the data and prepare action plans

Live reporting - action items

4. Action Items
a. I recommend acceptance of the donation of 5 digital cameras and one camcorder from Mr. Robert Salzberg of Resh, Inc. for the Davis Thayer Elementary School.  removed as duplicate from prior meeting
b. I recommend acceptance of a check for $1148.00 from the Oak St. PCC for a Gr. 2 field trip to Stony Brook in May as detailed.  motion to accept, passed 7-0
c. I recommend acceptance of a check for $1000.00 from the Panther Lacrosse Association to be used towards the fitness center at FHS. motion to accept, passed 7-0
d. I recommend acceptance of a check for $500.00 from the Singleton Family Foundation for the FHS Special Education Department.  motion to accept, passed 7-0
e. I recommend acceptance of a check for $3000.00 from the Davis Thayer PCC for field trips as detailed.  motion to accept, passed 7-0
f. I recommend acceptance of the donation of a Visual Presenter from Mr. Robert Salzberg of Resh, Inc. for the Davis Thayer Elementary School.  motion to accept, passed 7-0
g. I recommend approval of the request of Ms. Leardi & Mrs. Waters of the FHS for a trip to London, England on June 25, 2010 as detailed.  motion to accept, passed 7-0
h. I recommend adoption of Policy ADA – School District Goals & Objectives.  motion to accept, passed 7-0
i. I recommend approval of the request of Peter Light for an additional Assistant Track coach at a cost of $1,467.00 to be funded from the Athletic Revolving Account to assist with increased student participation.   motion to accept, passed 7-0
j. I recommend adoption of Policy ACE – Non-Discrimination on the basis of Disability.  motion to accept, passed 7-0

Live reporting - Discussion only items

3. Discussion Only Items

• Second Reading:

Policy ADA – School District Goals & Objectives
Policy ACE – Non-Discrimination on the basis of Disability

no further discussions needed, moving to action items

Live reporting - Q&A - Preliminary budget discussion

Glynn - what are ramifications of not going for the NEASC accreditation?
Sabolinski - we will no longer have an external evaluation of our standard educational processes



Glynn - The technologists that we cut hurt our development as a 21st Century
Sabolinski - yes, those folks would help the teachers learn and implement technology into their classrooms


Cafasso - Q on tying the numbers back to the last year budget documents
Goodman - carefully explained the difference in the numbers to tie them together


Trahan - is the wage deferment in these?
Sabolinski - no, that was last year, nothing for this year at this point.


Decision making tree


Rohrbach - I put some thoughts down (handout to be added later)


1 - District wide impact on staff/program reduction

• number of students affected
• K-12 continuum - feeder program considerations

2 - Impact to or conflict with the following

• FPS educational philosophy
• Educational policy i.e. DESE
• Financial savings
• Financial costs i.e. unemployment
• Grant funding
• School Committee guidelines i.e class size
• Space needs
• Collective bargaining

add 
accreditation
community priorities

Communities needs to provide some guidelines on how much we can cut and how low we can go

Roy - FY 2006 we spent more in 2 catagories, FY 2007, we only did one category, in FY 2008 we are under in all eleven categories, we expect to be under in FY 2009 numbers. The amazing thing is that we are still a high performing district despite that.

What is a broad definition for core academic areas? Should music and art get equal treatment with the other core subject matters.

It is a balance between the core and the extra-curriculars as we are trying to educate the whole child.

Starting the discussion now gets a better chance to keep to it.

Are these ranked in order of priorities? or are these just a general listing

It would be interesting to see where the principals and administration would come up with their listing and how close it would be to this

I am not a fan of going through a death by 1,000 cuts

If I can live with a program going away, if it is gone it is gone. You need to be able to live with it going away and not coming back.

You can start talking about reductions until you know what the magnitude is?

Possible Saturday working session with Principals to get to hear from them directly