The Reading Special Education Advisory Council (SEPAC) presents “Anxiety and School Performance” on Tuesday, October 25th at 7:00 p.m. in the Reading Memorial High School Library Media Center. The workshop will be presented by the Middlesex Partnership for Youth, a branch of the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office.
Admission is free and all are welcome to attend. For further information, please contact sepacreading@gmail.com.
Dear Reading Public School Community and the Greater Reading Community,
As you probably know by now, the ballot question for a Proposition 2 ½ override did not pass at last Tuesday’s town election. On behalf of the students and staff of the Reading Public Schools, I certainly want to thank all the staff, parents, and community members who worked tirelessly during their personal time in an effort to support the schools and to engage in discussions regarding this important town issue.
As we now look ahead, I want to first reassure everyone that the result of Tuesday’s election does not have a financial impact on this current school year. We are continuing to work diligently to provide the best education possible for our students and to support our staff with the resources that are available. In preparation for next year’s FY18 School Department budget, we will follow the normal budget process over the next several weeks and work closely with administrators, town officials, and School Committee members to determine the financial impact of this vote and how it will affect our schools. The School Committee will review the recommended FY18 budget in January, the Town Manager will receive and review the School Committee budget in February, and Town Meeting will vote on a final budget in April. As a team, we will of course do everything we can to optimize available resources and develop a budget that supports the learning and teaching in our schools and that continues to prioritize the achievement and development of all students.
Throughout this process, we will keep you informed with timely information. I will use our District Website, the Pathways Newsletter and the Pathways Blog as the primary communication tool to disseminate district information. In the near future, I will also be communicating Superintendent’s Office Hours during which staff and/or community members can come and discuss questions or concerns about our school district. If you hear or read information from other sources and you have questions or need clarification, please always feel free to contact me, your school principal, or central office administrators. It is important that the information we communicate is timely and accurate, and we will do everything possible to keep lines of communication open.
I realize that many staff and parents in our district are very disappointed by Tuesday’s outcome, and are concerned that our current district goals and student outcomes will be impacted by the failed override. I also realize, however, that we can persevere in our unfailing commitment to provide the best possible education for our students, regardless of the challenges. I want to thank the community members who have already contacted our schools in the last few days to offer support and gratitude to our staff and administrators. I know the encouragement is so appreciated. The dedication of our entire staff is amazing, and I am inspired by our staff’s tireless commitment to children that can be witnessed on a daily basis at every school.
If you have any questions, comments, or thoughts, please do not hesitate to contact me. And most importantly, thank you all for what you do every day for the children of the Reading Public Schools.
John F. Doherty, Ed.D.
Superintendent of Schools
Good Morning,
I hope that you are having a great weekend. It looks like the weather today will be better than the first half of the weekend!
Below, please find this week’s Pathways Newsletter. In this week’s edition, there is an article about Moving Forward After the Override Vote, a story about RMHS Senior Laura Richards speaking to Joshua Eaton students, an article about the role teachers should play on political issues, and an article about building a growth mindset through the arts. There are also photos from Wood End, Camp Bournedale, and the RMHS High Fives for the week.
Have a great rest of the weekend and week ahead!
Good Morning,
We hope that you are enjoying this beautiful weekend. Below, please find a copy of this week’s Pathways newsletter. In the newsletter, there is an update on the RMHS litigation, the RCASA event called Hidden in Plain Site, Getting students reading and responding in four levels of rigor, and mindfulness. There are also photos from RMHS and Killam.
Have a great rest of the weekend and week ahead!
Take care.
At a joint meeting of the Reading Board of Selectmen and School Committee, the Reading School Committee voted to request that the Board of Selectmen vote to call a Special Town Meeting during November Town Meeting to address the High School construction litigation with TLT Construction Corporation that began in 2007. The Board of Selectmen will vote on this request at their next meeting on October 25th. At the Special Town Meeting, the timeline of events over the last decade will be reviewed, a funding vote will be requested, and the settlement process will be outlined in order to ensure that no funds from operating budgets will be impacted.
The Reading Memorial High School construction project began in 2004, and TLT Construction Corporation was the general contractor for the project. In the fall of 2007, TLT filed a lawsuit in Middlesex Superior Court against the Town of Reading, claiming that the Town owed additional money for work performed under the contract. In response, the Town filed a counterclaim, alleging that TLT did not complete the contract work on time and that the Town had to correct various parts of the project work TLT did perform.
In 2013, after several years of the litigation discovery process and attempts at reaching a settlement with TLT, the court referred the case to a Special Master, a retired judge, who conducted a hearing process in lieu of a trial in the Superior Court. The hearings began in December of 2013 and concluded in March of 2015. Closing arguments were presented in July of 2015. Since that time, the Master has been preparing, and issuing to the parties, draft decisions on the various issues that make up the matters in dispute. These issues included payment to TLT for asbestos abatement work, the Town’s replacement of the outdoor track, compensation to TLT for additional work outside the scope of the contract, correction of site work, and liquidated damages for failure to complete the work on time. The first draft ruling was issued in January of 2016, and the most recent ruling, which left only a small portion of the claims still to be decided, was issued in September of 2016. The net result of the rulings to date is approximately 3 million dollars, in TLT’s favor.
If the process continued, each party would have the opportunity to respond to the draft rulings with proposed revisions, and the Special Master would then prepare a final report to the Superior Court. Under the applicable legal procedure, the court would review the Master’s final report and may adopt it, reject it in whole or in part, or send it back to the Master with instructions for additional action. Ultimately, the Superior Court would enter a judgement in the case, whether on its first receipt of the Special Master’s report or after such additional action by the Master as it may order. On account of the volume of material to be reviewed, a Superior Court judgment would not be expected until sometime well into 2017. By Massachusetts statute, a court judgment is subject to 12% annual interest, and interest would apply from the date the complaint was filed in November, 2007. As a result, the amount of the judgment would now more than double. If the final court judgment were issued in late 2017, it is expected that the total amount could be close to $7,000,000 in TLTs favor.
Given these circumstances, the School Committee and TLT have reached a tentative settlement agreement in the amount of $ 6 million, subject to Town Meeting approval. If approved by Town Meeting, the settlement would be paid through three sources of funding: remaining funds from the RMHS building project (approximately $800,000), certified free cash, and borrowing—with the debt being paid off over a period of several years. No operating budget funds would be utilized, and the result of the override election will not have an impact on the funding sources for the settlement. It should also be noted that the override vote scheduled for October 18th is to support the operating budgets for the town and schools, and has no real impact on the capital plan. The override was not required because of this legal settlement.
As a result of the settlement, it is expected that capital projects currently on the 10-year capital plan (i.e. roof replacements, field replacements, and capital equipment) would be pushed out additional years into the future in order to disperse the impact. Town officials are also exploring the possibility of additional MSBA reimbursement funding for the High School project. As several people have understandably inquired, town and school officials want to also clarify and emphasize again that this issue is not related in any way to the need for an override ballot question. Even if the litigation had been resolved years ago, an operational override would be necessary at this time to sustain current services of the town and schools—and to address the structural deficit in the operating budgets that has been developing over the last several years. Revenue from an override would successfully address these identified deficits. Although litigation has taken years, it was a process that legal counsel at the time believed was the best course of action. After almost a decade-long process, however, the School Committee supports moving forward on a settlement in order to bring the litigation process to a necessary close and to best position our Town and schools for the future.
By Reading Elementary Principals
There are several beliefs about recess that are universal in all schools. No child believes that there is enough recess in the school day. All children believe that their teachers’ watches are broken and that they do not time the recess correctly. Everyone believes in a different temperature at which it’s “too cold” to be outside. In our experience, these beliefs are held by most students.
However, even if we cannot reconcile these beliefs with fact, we do think there should be consistency among the Reading elementary schools in terms of minutes of recess. Last year, the elementary principals embarked on a mission to standardize the school day across the schools and as a result, increased overall recess time in the elementary schools. As a result of that work, the following recess standard was adopted by all the Reading elementary schools:
While we set a common standard for minutes, we did not set a common way that time is spent. Each building has its own building based programs and specialists allocation which present different scheduling challenges between the schools. In some schools recess is scheduled in 15 minute blocks and in others in 30 minute blocks. Some schools schedule recess on Wednesday (our short day) and some do not.
Recess is a crucial and necessary component of a child’s development and plays a significant role in promoting the overall development of the whole child (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2013). The benefits of physical education and physical fitness are well-recognized, leading to improved personal and academic performance. We continue to look at our practices and focus on meeting the needs of all students.
The Reading Coalition Against Substance Abuse will be sponsoring, Hidden in Plain Sight at the Reading Police Community Room from October 17th-19th. Specific times are listed on the flier below.
This event is an actual simulation of a teen’s bedroom that contains common household items that can be substance abuse warning signs. This event is for adults only.
More information is on the flier below. For further information, contact Julie DeAngelis at jdeangelis@ci.reading.ma.us.
Good Morning,
We hope that you are having a great long weekend. Below is this week’s edition to the Pathways Newsletter. This week’s edition has stories and photos on the following:
Enjoy the weekend! Take care.
Rediker, our PlusPortal host, has mobile apps available for Android and iOS devices for parents and students. Both apps, ParentPlus and StudentPlus provide access to school announcements, alerts and the combined calendar. Most importantly, the apps enable quick and secure access to all the information on your portal pages. Parents and students have reported that this is very useful for keeping up with information.
The free apps are available from the iTunes App Store and Google Play. Once downloaded, the app will prompt you to register by entering your School Name. Our district school names are listed below. For example, if you use www.plusportals.com/ReadingHS just enter ReadingHS to register. Parents will need to register each school for which they have PlusPortal access.
Arthur W. Coolidge Middle School – CoolidgeMS
Birch Meadow School – BirchMeadowES
J. Warren Killam School – KillamES
Joshua Eaton School – JoshuaEatonES
Reading Memorial High School – ReadingHS
Walter S. Parker Middle School – WSParkerMS
Wood End School – WoodEndES
RISE Preschool – RISEPreschool
Alice M. Barrows School – BarrowsES
If you have any questions, please contact the Instructional Technology Specialist for your child’s school.
Elementary: Kathy Santilli (Kathleen.Santilli@reading.k12.ma.us)
Parker: Meg Powers (Meg.Powers@reading.k12.ma.us)
Coolidge: Marcia Grant (Marcia.Grant@reading.k12.ma.us)
RMHS: Janet Dee (Janet.Dee@reading.k12.ma.us)
Good Morning,
We hope that you are having a great weekend, in spite of the soggy weather. Below is a link to this week’s Pathways Newsletter. There are several school related articles this week that focus on accommodations for students who are celebrating religious holidays, the state release of student assessment data, a special education update, and an update from the Safety and Traffic Control Officer. There is also an article on Harnessing Adolescent Rebelliousness. There are also photos from some of our staff professional development activities this past week and the RCASA Annual Meeting.
Have a great rest of the weekend and week ahead!
The Journey-The Next Chapter 