Ep. 90, Last Night @ School Committee: 8/31 Meeting Recap

Last Night At School Committee

Last night was the first School Committee meeting of the new school year, and it began by introducing the Committee’s newest member, Chantal Lima Barbosa. The first report of the evening was on the results of an external investigation into allegations that BPS leaders discriminated against administrators of color, which concluded that there were no findings of racial discrimination. The meeting continued with the Superintendent’s Report, which focused on back-to-school readiness. Superintendent Skipper shared that hundreds of new educators, bus drivers, bus monitors, and food service workers have been hired, addressing the large number of vacancies from last year. She also announced that, by the end of this semester, over 100 school kitchens will be fully operational and provide daily, scratch-cooked “My Way Café” meals, more than double the number of operational kitchens from last year. The Superintendent’s team also shared that all bus routes have been assigned and half have successfully performed test runs, with the goal of concluding all test runs before school begins next Thursday. The Superintendent then discussed facilities assessment – a topic highlighted in news coverage over the last year in light of plans to reconfigure BPS high schools and polling data concerning a lack of satisfaction with high school options. She shared that a rubric to assess facility conditions will be determined based on feedback from public hearings over the coming months, and a public tool with information about each building will be available later this fall.

After a brief public comment period, the Committee heard two additional reports. The first was a revised admissions policy for Madison Park, addressing concerns that the previously-announced policy presented unnecessary barriers. The revised policy calls for a letter of interest from the applicant, rather than an artifact and two letters of recommendation, and it received a positive response from Committee members. However, questions remain as to whether BPS plans to end its policy of administratively assigning students to Madison Park who do not choose to go there (currently 30% of the student body), and the Superintendent said she will have more information on this at a later date. The second report was the Committee’s evaluation of the Superintendent, which highlighted divisions among members in how they perceive Superintendent Skipper’s performance over the past year. Members acknowledged that this was a difficult transition year in which the Superintendent sought to address significant issues she inherited from the previous administration, and they gave her an overall rating of “proficient.”

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