Denise Spencer: School Committee meeting reminder - 9/28/21 - 7 PM

Agenda: https://t.co/MeTmk6OR8A

Zoom: https://t.co/phH4kzbbEZ 

Shared from Twitter: https://t.co/6uYviqTuvq

Denise Spencer: School Committee meeting reminder - 9/28/21 - 7 PM

Franklin TV: "Demand! Videos on Demand – and now, Podcasts on Demand"

by Pete Fasciano, Executive Director 09/26/2021

The media world keeps expanding. Our services keep expanding. And with that, the work to support them, but expand we must. People demand on demand services. This week we have added audio podcasts to our wfpr●fm website. Not only can you listen live, anytime, anywhere, you can now listen to any of wfpr●fm’s past programs – on demand, as audio podcasts.

Our entire podcast library is online at wfpr●fm. Click on ‘Past Shows’. Easy! They are also posted on Franklin Matters.

That’s a lot of podcasts. Like the old George Carlin skit on those Fabulous TV Music Collections: Every Recording Ever Made. “Take a 10 year sabbatical and listen to these fine recordings.”

Question: Is podcasting in your future? What would your podcast sound like? We can help. Let’s discuss. You could be on the radio – on demand – and in demand as a podcast.

Call us at 509=541-4118, or email us at: info@wfpr●fm, or info@Franklin●TV

And –  as always –
Thank you for listening to wfpr●fm. 

And, thank you for watching. 

wfpr.fm Podcasts on Demand

Get this week's program guide for Franklin.TV and Franklin Public Radio (wfpr.fm) online  http://franklin.tv/programguide.pdf  or for archive purposes  https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kGZTnfZwlXzVEXIIFdwiT-M19XQAiR_w/view?usp=sharing

Mass. Public Health: Get Outraged! Information on vaping

"Vapes come in all shapes and sizes. But most have one thing in common: nicotine. 

Get Outraged was created to help parents uncover the truth about vaping and keep kids healthy and safe. 

Learn more at https://t.co/FTB7qi7p7f " or  https://www.mass.gov/get-outraged

Shared from Twitter: https://t.co/lGO2Vk1W4T

Video link -> https://youtu.be/61qY4ooWWvE

Dan Rather: We Need a New Vocabulary For Our Politics...

Terminology is always key. I have told a story that grass is green, Your grass maybe greener than mine or vice versa, but we both know 'green grass'. When it comes to ordering a particular shade of green, the color match becomes critical and the terminology plays more of a role. Emerald green, lime green, dark green... You get the point. 

The conservation of the terms we use for politics distorts how quickly our politics can and has changed.  ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

	We Need a New Vocabulary For Our Politics... Dan Rather, Elliot Kirschner, and Steady Team Sep 26 Why have I started this post with a picture of an old telephone? Because I've been thinking a lot lately that what we call a "phone" today is nothing like what we used to call a phone.  I know this is no great revelation, but bear with me for a moment, because I believe there is a strong parallel to be made between this observation and what we are seeing in our current political world, and how we talk about it.  Simply put, we use vocabulary from the past to talk about the present in a way that can, if we are not careful, be very distorting. Much like the powerful computer/camera/reader/flashlight/alarm clock/tracking device we carry around in our purses or pockets has only a tangential relation to traditional notions of the telephone, the nomenclature we use to reference political parties, the courts, and the other institutions of our civic life is equally tenuous.  Democrats, Republicans, moderates, liberals, conservatives - we use these terms as if they are rooted and unchanging in their definitions, like, say, mountains, oceans, or apples. But there is a big difference between the words we use to describe the constructions of human society and those we use for nature. When it comes to how we live and interact, we are agents of increasingly rapid change. We use words to try to create common understandings and tie the present to the past. But broad terms cover up the diversity of the human experience, and how things change over time. People live in "homes" all over the world. But a "house" in one place can be very different from a "house" somewhere else. And certainly our homes today are similar but also very different from the houses of the past.  The conservation of the terms we use for politics distorts how quickly our politics can and has changed. We must remember we are a very young country. Only 245 years (a little over three average modern American lifespans) separates our current time from the Declaration of Independence. For me, at least, that fact never ceases to shock. It resonates how much we have changed, and how quickly.  We need to really think hard about how antiquated some of our descriptions for our current state of affairs have become. Let's start with who makes up the citizenship of our country. It is nothing like what it was, even in the not-too-distant past. We are much more diverse, by any metric you could think of. We are also more urban, more educated, and more mobile. And yet there is a strong bias to think of "average Americans" as those who would be conjured up in decades past. Proof of this can be found in the seeming obsession by the political press to hunker down for interviews with voters in rural diners. These Americans are asked their opinion about the direction of the country a lot more than a young immigrant in the Bronx.  Because political parties are tied to voters, the changes noted above have also led to tremendous change around what it means to be a Democrat and Republican. When I was younger, we talked of the "solid South," which referred to the lock the Democrats had on the Southern states - a legacy of the Civil War. Looking at present political maps, the red-blue divide looks very different. The South is Republican, which again has a lot to do with race and the legacy of the Civil War, except that the affiliation of the political parties has changed. In 2020, however, Biden won two Southern states - Virginia (which has become an increasingly blue state) and also Georgia. That's because states change as well. Both of those states increasingly have become places that draw an educated workforce to cities and suburbs, and this cohort has become more reliably Democratic voters. So yes we can talk about Georgia and Virginia as part of the South, or even part of the original 13 colonies, but what that means for today is different from what it meant in the past. In a counter example, West Virginia was once one of the most Democratic states in the union and now it is one of the most Republican.  Once one acknowledges all this churn it brings into question some of the other descriptive terminology we tend to use. What really is a conservative, a liberal, a moderate? How can you be a conservative and care nothing about conserving the planet? How can you be called a moderate and do nothing to moderate the greatest assault on democracy in generations? Is it a liberal value to adhere to the science of vaccines?  Subscribe now This idea of conservative and liberal becomes even more strained when we try to apply it to the courts, particularly the current Supreme Court. We talk about the "conservative" justices, as if they are holding back the mobs to protect the sanctity of the Constitution. In reality they are laying waste to settled Constitutional rights and condoning attacks on our democratic process. Doesn't seem very conservative to me.  I would humbly suggest that journalists in particular pay attention to these questions of semantics. Because what you call something matters. It shapes how the public sees reality. The term "liberal" might suggest a movement that is unrestrained, whereas "conservative" might suggest a movement that is secure and grounded. Is that really an accurate portrayal of Democrats and Republicans today? Even the idea of two equal political parties simply vying for votes, Democrats this and Republicans that, is a mischaracterization of what each of these parties has become and how they function. Political parties in our history have had leaders, but they have not been cults of personality. The terminology of a "party" suggests a core set of beliefs, a platform on which candidates run, even if they do not agree on all the issues. But today's Republicans are less a party than a mass movement with fealty to a would-be authoritarian. They didn't even try to produce a platform for the 2020 campaign. Instead, their voters, in a party that long championed "family values," embraced a man who was morally bankrupt. This included a vast majority of white, evangelical voters. Similarly, the party that piously lectured on fiscal responsibility when Democrats wanted to spend money, eagerly opened the checkbook to a grifter.  It is understandable that we seek to hold on to familiar terms to try to make sense of the present. That's how language works. We need some common points of comprehension. And languages do evolve. But it takes time. Right now, we don't have time to sit back and wait. We need to develop the words that accurately describe the dangers we are seeing. We can't let comfortable euphemisms and terminology cloud out the truths of our moment. To try to come up with new ways to describe our politics is not an easy undertaking, but it is a necessary one. If we hope to accurately diagnose what ails us and find solutions rooted in the current reality, we must let go of the definitions of the past. Subscribe now Share this Sunday Essay © 2021 Dan Rather  111 Sutter Street, 7th Floor, San Francisco, CA 94104

"Vaccines shine in preventing deaths"

Ashish K. Jha, MD, MPH (@ashishkjha) tweeted on Sat, Sep 25, 2021:

"The southern surge is slowing

And cases in some Northern states rising

So it is all seasonal? Are vaccines working?

Let's look at data

Today the 10 LEAST vaccinated states had

2X the cases
3X the hospitalizations
5X the deaths

compared to 10 most vaccinated states

Thread ->  https://twitter.com/ashishkjha/status/1441968897981353984?s=03

A lot of folks have been arguing the summer surge was "seasonal" And now, the northern half of US poised to get hit And if you look at states with biggest outbreaks today Alaska, ID, WY, WV, MT, KY, ND Largely not in the deep south So should all northern states worry? 2/4 https://twitter.com/ashishkjha/status/1441968899050909697

While we see cases rising in northern states There are two distinct patterns here: 1. States with low vax rates getting slammed, having to ration hospital beds 2. States with high vax rates rising slowly with lots of hospital capacity And the most interesting part? https://twitter.com/ashishkjha/status/1441968900070125568

Widening gap in cases vs deaths! High vax states: 50% fewer cases per capita But 80% fewer deaths! Vaccines shine in preventing deaths So if you're worried about this fall More testing, masks will help But getting more folks vaccinated still key to avoiding bad surge End https://twitter.com/ashishkjha/status/1441968901068402688

#TrustTheFacts #GetTheVax

 

The Guardian: "Femicides in the US: the silent epidemic few dare to name"

"The last week of July, as Gabby Petito and her fiance, Brian Laundrie, posted Instagram photos of themselves hiking barefoot in Utah’s Canyonlands national park, bronzed skin matching apricot-colored rocks, the body of Jerri Winters was discovered in Clinton Township, Michigan.

Her boyfriend, Matthew Lewinski, immediately admitted to the police he strangled her last December, keeping her mutilated body in the basement of the home they shared for months.

The same week, down in Starkville, Mississippi, William Chisholm was convicted of capital murder in the death of his ex-girlfriend Dr Shauna Witt. One month following her breaking up with him, Chisholm stormed the Walmart eye clinic where Witt worked as an optometrist and shot her dead.

Over in Baltimore, Maryland, Gomezgeka Chisala was that same week being held without bail after confessing to the killing of his ex-girlfriend Shaunya Green, a life-loving nurse and mother of two who once traveled to Africa to walk among elephants. Earlier in the month, Chisala had driven to Green’s home with a gun, entered into an argument with her and shot her dead."

Continue reading the article online. (Subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/sep/26/femicide-us-silent-epidemic

A woman with a red hand painted on her face, which calls attention to the high rates of Indigenous women who are murdered or missing. Photograph: Kevin Mohatt/Reuters

Franklin, MA: School Committee Meeting - Sep 28, 2021

School Committee Meeting

Municipal Building - Council Chambers (Virtual Link in Agenda)

Call to Order 
Pledge of Allegiance 
Moment of Silence

I. Routine Business
A. Review of Agenda
B. Citizen’s Comments

In the spirit of open communication, “the Committee will hold a public participation segment (also called Citizen’s Comments) about matters not related to an agenda item at the beginning of each regular School Committee meeting. The Committee will listen to, but not respond to any comment made…. A Committee member may add an agenda item to a future meeting as a result of a citizen comment…. The Committee will hear public comments related to an agenda item when the Chair deems appropriate during the Committee meeting. Topics for discussion during the meeting must be limited to those items listed on the Committee meeting agenda for that evening…. ” - from Policy BEDH

C. FHS Student Representative Comments
D. Superintendent’s Report

II. Guests/Presentations
A. Introduce Lily Rivera, Town & School Marketing/Communications Specialist
B. Digital Learning Plan – Alison Finley, Kate Merten, Chris Penza, Marianne Zogby and John Leighton

III. Discussion/Action Items
A. Franklin TV Board Appointment
I recommend the appointment of Rose Turco to the Franklin TV Board of Directors.
B. MASC Delegate
I recommend the Committee appoint Denise Spencer to serve as the Committee's delegate to the annual MASC Annual Meeting of Delegates as discussed.
C. Policy - Waiving 1st reading
I recommend waiving the First Reading of Policy EBCFA Face Coverings as discussed.
D. Policy Adoption
I recommend adopting policy EBCFA - Face Coverings as discussed.

IV. Discussion Only Items 

A. MASC Resolutions
B. ESSER III Funding Plan
C. Back to School Status Update – September 24, 2021

V. Information Matters
A. School Committee Sub-Committee Reports (e.g. Ad Hoc Supt. Evaluation, Budget, Community Relations/Public Schools Advocacy, Policy, Transportation)
B. School Committee Liaison Reports (e.g. Joint PCC, Substance Abuse Task Force, School Wellness Advisory Council)

VI. New Business
A. To discuss any future agenda items

VII. Consent Agenda
A. Approval of Minutes
I recommend approval of the September 14, 2021 School Committee minutes as detailed.
B. New FHS Club Approval
I recommend approval of the new FHS Clubs: Book Club, Hiking Club and Board and Games Club as detailed.

VIII. Payment of Bills Dr. Bergen
IX. Payroll Atty. Pond-Pfeffer

X. Adjournment

Agenda document with remote connection info ->   https://www.franklinps.net/sites/g/files/vyhlif4431/f/agendas/scagenda_9-28-21.pdf

Meeting packet folder -> https://www.franklinps.net/district/school-committee/pages/september-282021-school-committee-meeting-packet

Franklin, MA: School Committee Meeting - Sep 28, 2021