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The United Regional Chamber of Commerce celebrated the opening of its new downtown Franklin office location with a ribbon cutting ceremony and open house on Nov. 12. The new office is located at 4 West St. in Franklin. Local dignitaries and members of the Chamber came to the ribbon cutting to welcome the new office.
Chamber members and local dignitaries attended the opening of The United Regional Chamber of Commerce’s new Franklin office at 4 West St. recently. Attending the event from left to right are: Brian Doherty of B & M Clambakes, Olga Allen of The United Regional Chamber of Commerce, Franklin Town Clerk Deborah Pellegri, Matt Kelly of the Franklin Town Council, Renee Danho of Dean College, Jean St. Andre of Time for You Massage, Carl Scheinman of Dean Bank, Charlene Cabral of Ayotte-Cabral Insurance Agency, Terry Katsaros of Rockland Trust, Carie Ann Bailey of Middlesex Savings Bank, State Rep. Betty Poirier, Oreste D’Arconte of The Sun Chronicle and president of the Board of Directors of The United Regional Chamber of Commerce, Nathan Suhrer of Wedding Reels Video, Jack Lank of The United Regional Chamber of Commerce, State Rep. James Vallee, State Rep. Richard Ross, Rose McGrath of Ferguson Enterprises, Ed McDonough of Executive Coaching, Lisa Nelson of US Rep. James McGovern’s office, Mary Graff of Berry Insurance, Lisa Daly-Boockoff of The United Regional Chamber of Commerce, Irene Pelley of The United Regional Chamber of Commerce, Amanda Gentile of Hampton Inn Franklin and Wayne Reid of Hampton Inn Franklin.
5. Information Matters
Superintendent’s Report
Big Lots - opening the 19th, will donate $2500 to the Parmenter School
Still looking for folks to participate in the visioning sessions
Can't move them away from during the week, already scheduled
School Committee Sub-Committee Reports
budget subcommittee did meet on Friday
did come up with a game plan to run by everyone
Kindergarten full day, half day discussion - January 25th
Saturday budget workshop, January 29th
level service budget, same services with the increased costs
explaining the budget in detail, allowing to have conversation in detail with the administrators
Once the money we will get from the State and Town is clear, then we can adjust
Feb 1 public hearing
Budget adoption on Feb 15th
Space needs subcommittee tweaking the report for a Jan presentation
School Committee Liaison Reports
6. New Business
To discuss future business that may be brought before the School Committee.
FEF Casino night Nov 19th
7. Executive Session
Contractual Negotiations
motion to enter, not to return to public meeting passed 7-0
3. Discussion Only Items
Budget to Actual - no questions, no discussion
Bullying Prevention and Intervention Plan
Public comment period open through Dec 9th
Final discussion and vote on plan Dec 14th
Community Outreach
Bill Glynn
Why do we face such a challenge year after year?
The community needs to discuss this, all the stakeholders
I have attended PCC's meetings, I wholeheartedly agree with Steve, more of this is necessary
Cafasso - Community Relations Subcommittee needs to have a meeting
Engagement, everyone has their own style
if you are talking about communications as a committee, then we need to think about what we want to accomplish
the idea of an open mic night has come up before, a brief presentation then answer any and all questions
I prefer communications around specific matters of importance, i.e. the budget, the high school renovations
It is hard to talk about individual topics, logistically hard
No one is not in favor of it
Not just the channels, the medium, parents love the school newsletters
We have a lot of different options, take the different presentation and put them online and promote it
The problem is our website is not user friendly
A really good website would make this easier
We could revive our Facebook page, what do we link to?
Certainly the high school has to be a communications topic, and the budget has to be
Mullen - we need a more strategic effort, we have the subcommittee in place
attending the high school PCC, you have a good place where parents want to be, they don't meet that often
are you taking time away from another presentation that might be more strategic?
Rohrbach - I am sitting here thinking about what people are thinking about
We are communicating, we meet the Joint PCC's regularly and wait for an invitation
In addition to that, we are out pretty much everyone of us, at coffees, etc.
Our spring is virtually on the road if there is an override
The School Committee blog is active, the meeting is available via video on demand
we do do a lot, currently, we need to do so in a simplistic way so we are not overburdening them with data
I think we communicate very well, we need to assess how we can do it differently
I am in favor of doing a town wide forum once or twice a year
Roy - I do want to acknowledge the level of engagement is very high
Sabolinski - maybe our own category, almost very high
Roy - Franklin School Advocacy group, 7:00 PM 3rd floor training room
I can't think of a better public forum, we have a 100 comfortable chairs
I make an attempt to make these meetings as comfortable
I would love to see more people to engage in this forum
I get fearful that if we do too much people will get sick of us, I get fearful we'll burn out
People in the long run, will do the right thing
Trahan - challenging people in the community and empowering them
they need to come forward and want to get the information
Maybe what we need is to issue the challenge, tell us what you need
Cafasso - We need to talk with Tim Raposa, we need to focus on the website
it will take money to get it hosted.
Glynn - I agree with Ed that the budget and the high school are two key items
I think it is all opportunistic, it is all good
Sabolinski - the four top topics
budget, override, redistricting, programmatic (kindergarten, etc.)
Sample MASC Policy for Facebook and Social Networking
Looking for direction from the committee as to whether to review the current policy (JU) in light of this draft from the MASC:
27.5% percent of the graduating class earned the John and Abigail Adams Scholarship
Literacy work in the district makes a difference
Data analysis has doubled, so folks are getting the data to use and improve instruction and curriculum
Concern with increasing class size puts greater pressure on the special ed and low income students
MCAS is a moving target which in and f itself makes it hard to continue to perform
Core standards are in their final changes, the 2011 MCAS tests will reflect the current core standards
during 2012, the tests will be a hybrid of new standard and old standards
in 2013 the tests will be fully against material in the updated core standards
Cafasso - What happened in 2009 to cause the trough? (see slide 9 - Math subgroups Franklin to State Comparison)
Michele Kingsland-Smith - the 8th grade test is the hardest test they will take, as well as changes in the District which affected the instruction
Cafasso - I don't understand the growth slide, can you take a number
Kingsland-Smith - Better to see at an individual level, it measures the amount of growth for that performance in comparison to the other students. You may have had the same grade but you achieved your grade by growing more from the prior year than someone else.
Cafasso - you are highly efficient and we need to convince folks to continue to invest in this efficiency
Roy - Slide 13
Steve Sherlock - provided the analogy of the crew team, both finish in a tie, one had started out and got a big lead. the other team increased the rate of the strokes to finish in the tie. Hence the second team had a greater rate of strokes like the greater growth they are talking about.
A great presentation
Me: I concur, this is one of the better presentations I have seen, it makes sense.
