Good evening and welcome everyone to the January 22nd, 2025 meeting of this open meeting is being conducted remotely, consisted with an act relative to extending certain COVID-19 measures adopted during the state of emergency signed into law on June 16th, 2021 as amended and extended through March of 2025. These provisions allow public bodies to meet remotely as long as reasonable public access is afforded so the public can follow along with the deliberations of the meeting. For this meeting, the school committee, we're convening by Zoom and members of the public have been provided with access information so they can follow the meeting remotely.

As I said before, if you could turn your camera on when you speak, we would greatly appreciate that. And if you don't have your first and last name on your Zoom picture, could you please do that so we can make an accurate record?

So our first item on the agenda are public comments.

And I'm just going to, I know you guys, a lot of you came in, so I'm just going to go by what's at the top of my screen, okay? And Adam will keep the time. Okay, Casey McLaughlin.

Can you hear me? Yes. Great.

I will never forget sitting in the East Elementary Library in May of 2022, previewing the fifth grade puberty video, which discussed the hormonal changes of bodies with penises versus bodies with vaginas.

There were clear biological differences between the penis people and the vagina people, but no one was allowed to refer to them as boys or girls. I, of course, stood up and called it out and predictably got shouted down by angry parents in their N95s. But fast forward to 2025, and it turns out I was right. There are only two genders.

And now all we need to do is get in line with reality like we used to. The president's executive order signed into law on Monday makes clear there no such thing as gender separate from sex. However, Section 3, Part B states federally funded agencies shall enforce laws governing sex-based rights protections and accommodations to protect boys and girls as biologically distinct sexes. Section 4D states agencies shall ensure that intimate spaces like bathrooms and locker rooms are sex designated, not based on gender identity.

And Section 3D states federal funds shall not be used to promote gender ideology.

Therefore, Sharon Public School staff needs to stop teaching this gender nonsense as scientific fact. Efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex hurts girls the most because it really deprives them of their dignity, privacy, safety, and well-being.

This cultist, or let's say spiritual, slant on the health curriculum needs to be completely rewritten, starting with the fourth grade puberty video. Kindergarten morning meetings need to stop pushing sexual identities as an exciting option of self-discovery, and no one shall be compelled to use preferred pronouns under any circumstances.

SPS policy needs to reflect that, or else I fear, and we all should, that non-compliance will result in the withholding of federal funds. I, along with many other parents...

Okay, finish your sentence.

Yep, finishing my sentence.

I, along with many other parents in the district, can't wait for this to be immediately implemented.

Thank you, Julie. Okay, thank you, Casey. Okay, Jay O'Brien, you are up next.

Did I get you? Okay. Good evening.

I hope everyone had a great MAGA Monday, sounds like Casey did, and MLK Jr. Day. It's no coincidence that the second inauguration of President Trump fell on MLK Jr. Day. MLK Jr. was pro-American, and if he were alive, he would have voted for President Trump. I'll talk more about ending DEI and Sharon Public Schools in February.

As we saw Monday, and Casey alluded to, President Trump issued an executive order to defend women and children from gender cult ideology, extremism, and restoring biological truth. There is a bathroom at Cottage Elementary School where my six- and eight-year-old daughters go to school that reads all gender.

If you can see this. We want that sign taken down with a less ambiguous one replaced with this, which shows a male, female, and just the handicap sign to better reflect biological truth. If my tax dollars can pay for a new library and a new high school, surely we can afford new signs at the elementary schools.

The superintendent has yet to respond to me via email to tell me who decided to put the bathroom in, only that it was decided on a couple of years ago and that no child has used it. Hold on, baby. I did not vote for that, nor was I as a parent of daughters made aware of it. I only stumbled upon it during parent-teacher conference as it's mere steps from my kids' classroom.

Additionally, the only flag that should ever be on school grounds is the all-inclusive American- babies, sorry, sorry about that, is the all-inclusive American flag.

Sorry, parents, we've gotten rid of critical race theory, masks are never going to return, and BLM seems dead and gone because white liberals can't find another black victim to siphon funds from for their political gain. Dads with young elementary school kids, especially daughters, please help me and other parents by emailing the superintendent to make these same demands. We love everybody and we're not trying to hurt people, but I will protect my elementary school kids. If they were in middle school or high school, I might feel differently.

Thank you, MAGA, and God bless.

Thank you.

Thank you, Jay.

Okay, up next I have Ahmed Mohammed.

Hi, Judy. Good evening.

You guys hear me? Okay. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to speak.

I would like to discuss this school calendar.

Sharon is a very diverse community and with multi-faith, multi-culture, and it is essential to take diversity into the school calendar to ensure that we are inclusive and don't favor one group over the other.

I understand that it may be not feasible to close school for every group's holiday, but it's important to strive balance and representation.

And also, I hope the students should be able to enjoy their religious and culture holiday without worrying about exams or school work, and the school will have to find a way to implement this balance.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Ahmed.

Judy Crosby.

Thanks, Julie. I wanted to discuss a decision that was apparently made by this administration within the past 10-ish days to not invite Jessica Murphy, our incredibly talented director of student services, to return next year. Jessica has been with the district for a pretty extended time. I want to say we're on year six, perhaps, at the moment. Maybe even year six. She's nodding. I'm right. Year six.

And I've worked with Jessica in a number of capacities as a parent of students receiving SPED, you know, including in a grievance situation which was handled with tremendous professionalism.

I've worked with her as a member of CPAC. And importantly, I have worked as an advocate when I was not serving on school committee for families of children receiving services.

And I've seen our SPED directors in this district since 2004.

If you are making Jessica the fall girl for the poor budget choices made by this administration and this school committee, you need to rethink.

This decision is going to cost you a lot of money. Finding somebody with Jessica's deep experience and commitment is not going to happen.

And importantly, the issues that SPED has faced over the past year or two, particularly, have been exacerbated by this school committee spending all its money on a contract with the teachers, leaving none to pay their instructional assistants a living wage. So your instructional assistants are having huge turnover, and they're being pulled to provide substitute services because you didn't properly budget for subs. So SPED families have rightly called out that their children are not getting the services they're supposed to have. None of that's Jessica's fault. She can't magic money into existence.

This is a shameful decision and should be reversed.

Thank you.

Julie, you're muted. Sorry. Hi, Julie Pulaski.

You're good. Thank you. My name is Julie Pulaski and I'm an English teacher at Sharon High School.

As a teacher, instructional assistants are essential to do my job. They ensure students receive the education they deserve and they help guarantee appropriate learning environments for all students in the classroom and they are the essential support for some of our most vulnerable learners.

Unfortunately, I have seen talented IAs leave Sharon Public Schools time and time again. While there are many concerning reasons that factor into these decisions, a main one is the shockingly low pay that Sharon offers IAs. If you look at the numbers, it tells a clear story as to why Sharon is having a hard time hiring and retaining IAs. For example, if you look at the 2023 fiscal year in Canton, there an IA in their first year makes roughly about as much as a Sharon IA makes in their 12th year in Sharon Public Schools.

Sharon and IA and Sharon needs to be in the district 20 years to make roughly the same longevity pay IAs in can't make after five years in the district.

The district's refusal to pay a living wage means that Sharon is losing qualified dedicated educators.

After having the opportunity to witness negotiations last year myself, it has been incredibly disheartening to see school committees unwillingness to negotiate in good faith. While it's unfortunate that you would prefer to hear the facts from a mediator rather than directly from the IAs who are working this job day in and day out, we hope that you can hear loud and clear that STA instructional assistants are valued members of our community and deserve a living wage. Thank you for your time. Thank you. And Ms. Pocaski, I'm sorry I mispronounced your name. Next is Khaled, oh no, another name.

I'm sorry if I'm ruining your name.

Khaled Aissa.

Did I do it close?

Yeah, yeah, pretty close. Not too bad. You can hear me, correct?

Okay. Well, thanks everyone for giving me the chance to speak. It's, I'm just, I'm talking as a concerned parent of the community and I may have access to our community members that maybe the school committee members don't really interact with as much. Last year when we were talking about the calendar, we discussed other potential days to be added as days off.

Particularly for me, the Eid was, we were very excited about the possibility of adding the Eid as a holiday.

Eventually a decision was made to make only federal holidays and the calendar was published.

It seemed for us that under pressure, the calendar again was changed to include additional holiday days. And at that time there were multiple minority groups were excluded.

This happens quite often in our district.

It felt that the school committee members do not really represent every minority group and the whole sharing community.

For 2026, we, I'm just pointing out these days because these are days I'm aware of as a Muslim, the Eid in March and May. These are the days the most significant for us. And I'm sure that other minority groups have important days as well. I think for the inclusion of these days in the school calendars and the holidays would demonstrate the district commitment to inclusivity.

It would really send a strong message to the Muslim students in the schools, especially when we see a sharp rise in STEM program across the country. Thank you so much for giving me a chance.

Thank you very much.

Mira Belenke.

Hi, can you hear me? Yeah. Thank you. Members of the school committee.

A December poll found that 77% of parents in the US say that boys should not be allowed in girls' bathrooms, even if they identify as girls. Just last week, a New York Times poll found that 79% of Americans believe that boys shouldn't play on girls' sports teams. And that includes 67% of Democrats.

I can't think of an issue with more consensus in our country.

And that's why it's not at all surprising that on Monday, President Trump signed an executive order recognizing the biological reality of the two sexes and their sex-based rights.

This order means biology-based federal policies on school bathrooms and sports. It means federal penalties for schools that transition kids behind parents' backs. It means federal penalties for schools that teach unscientific beliefs like being born in the wrong body. It means federal penalties for schools which teach fake foreign languages with made-up words.

The order directs the federal government to write guidance, to investigate, and to litigate, and it makes it a priority across the executive.

The gender-related policies and practices of the Sharon schools are unpopular and soon to be heavily penalized under federal law. It's time to back away from these harmful practices and prepare an offering.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mira.

And Liz Dickinson.

Did you get it?

Okay. Yes, thank you. Hi, my name is Liz Dickinson.

I teach fifth grade at Heights Elementary School, and I'm going to read a letter on behalf of an IA named Hope Kennedy.

Good evening, school committee members. My name is Hope Kennedy. I have been an instructional assistant at Sharon Middle School for two years.

I also was a paraprofessional in Boston Public Schools for 16 years, but it been in the school system for 25 years. I love my job, but the reason that I have to write this letter is disheartening.

The instructional assistants, as you know, are currently without a contract that is really sad and demoralizing.

Our work is highly important, just like the teachers, especially considering the population we serve. We have families that depend on us to make sure things are running as a well-oiled machine when it comes to their children's education.

There's a great love shown by all the instructional assistants for the job we do and the dedication to our students.

But because we are not receiving a livable wage, it takes time away from our families.

Some people are working two jobs to make ends meet. I am currently working three jobs. I don't get to see my family until 8pm at night from being gone at 6 in the morning every day. I hope that this situation will be solved very soon with all parties in agreement of what is needed for us to survive.

Lastly, I challenge you to think really hard about how you would feel if your child, husband, or wife was in this situation.

Would you be happy with how they're being treated?

What would you say to them and how would you react? Putting on the shoes of another sometimes brings light to a dark path. All we are asking is for respect and honor for all the hard work we do. Thank you for your time. Hope Kennedy.

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

And we will have Hala Mustafa next.

Thanks Julie.

How are you? Hi everyone.

I'm Hala Mustafa.

I'm a parent and I'm here to talk about some concerns about the calendar.

First, I would like to say happy Martin Luther King week. And as we celebrate Dr. King, we must reflect on the principles of fairness, justice, and equity that he championed.

It is difficult to ignore the inequity in closing the entire school for one student group holiday while overlooking the important holidays of students from other backgrounds.

As a parent, it has been extremely inconvenient for my family and children not to feel honored by the school and not to be able to celebrate our holidays with the same convenience other families do. Today, I'm here to request fairness for my children and to advocate for other families who share this experience.

For my culture, I'm asking that the school include Idil Fitr on March 20th and Idil Adha on May 27th for the next school calendar.

I sincerely hope that the school committee members and the administration will consider this request and vote in a way that ensure fairness and inclusivity for all students, not just for the best interest of their voters.

Thank you. Thank you, Hala.

And Judith Weider.

Hold on.

Did you get it?

Okay.

Yeah, I did. Thank you, Julie.

So sort of piggybacking off of what Ms. Mustafa had said and what others have said, for sure, I don't celebrate the Islamic holidays.

And so for me, I just want to make sure that folks within the community do feel included.

So the one request I would have is if you're going to include additional holidays, please make sure that those are actually timed for when people need to worship. I had heard that the worship is actually in the morning, which means that a half day doesn't actually help. So like making sure that you're talking with members of the community so that it's actually at the right time for them. The other thing that I want to key off of is that there were three voices that have already spoken up that were exceptionally transphobic and holy cow, that were very, very offensive.

If you actually read the executive order that was issued, yes, it does in fact set that President Trump only recognizes that there are two genders and that they're assigned at conception, which means congratulations, all of you who currently identify as gentlemen, you are now in fact ladies, because the male gender assignment wouldn't even come until about six weeks post conception.

I would also like to point out that all these people who are having panic attacks about bathrooms, if you've ever used a bathroom on an airline, on an airplane, for example, guess what, you've used a gender neutral bathroom, and somehow you've lived to tell the tale. So please stop with the fear mongering.

And lastly, I would like to say hopefully there are no students listening in on this other than the ones that are actually required to because dear lord that amount of hatred being spewed is totally unfair.

But if you were listening, I want you to know the Trevor Project is one of the places that you can go to if you need help. You can even text the word start to 678-678 or go to thetrevorproject.org.

Not all parents support hate in this town. Thank you.

Thank you, Judy.

All right.

I think that is everyone.

And I thank you all very much for your comments and also for staying in the two-minute time limit.

I will now turn it over to Shauna for correspondence.

All right. Thank you, Julie. The school committee has received 35 pieces of correspondence between January 8, 2025 at 9 a.m. and January 22, 2025 at 9 a.m. A parent wrote to express their concerns regarding the heating situation in the East Elementary School.

The letter cited Massachusetts laws regarding winter heating in schools. The assistant town administrator, Lauren Barnes, provided the school committee with information regarding the opening of the warrant for the Springtown meeting.

A parent wrote to inquire whether Sharon had been impacted by the recent power school cybersecurity incident.

A parent wrote to share information regarding a recent ruling by a federal court in Kentucky regarding Title IX. We received a number of emails from parents in the community who provided feedback on the kindergarten fee. These emails offered the following perspectives.

The importance of kindergarten and child's educational growth and development.

Free full-day kindergarten should be a value embraced and prioritized by the district and town. The recognition that free full-day kindergarten is a fundamental to an excellent, is fundamental, sorry, to an excellent school district.

Request to revisit the vote on the kindergarten fee for the 25-26 school year. Request to remove the fee for the 25-26 school year. Request to reduce the fee for 25-26 school year. Request to reduce the K fee by 25 percent over the next four years to move towards full free full-day K in year four. Removing the kindergarten fee would help reinforce the values that the district welcomes and accommodates all families.

Begin working towards a path to reduce and eliminate kindergarten fee. Better understanding of the district budget and priority decisions that were made in the budgeting process. Request to fully understand the fee structure to ensure that paying students are not subsidizing the costs of non-paying students or reduced fee students and to confirm the amount that the district is contributing to the revolving fund per kindergarten seat.

We received an edition of Millie's METCO newsletter that highlighted the events going on across several METCO districts.

The school committee received an invitation to attend a community leader meeting being held on February 26, 2025, which is being sponsored by the Sharon Pluralism Network.

The Sharon School Committee received a request to move the half-day early release time in the early childhood center to 12 30 pm. A parent wrote to request that the school committee consider adding both Eid Fatah and Eid Aha to the school district calendar to demonstrate the district's commitment to inclusivity.

Eid Fatah and Eid Fatah and Eid Fatah and Eid Fatah and Eid Fatah and Eid Fatah and Eid Fatah and Eid Fatah Thank you so much, Shauna.

I have been informed that because of exams, our student representative is not available this evening.

So we will move to the first item on the agenda are the superintendent updates.

Unfortunately, Dr. Patelio is experiencing a family emergency so he's unavailable to be here.

And in his place, I'd like to invite Dr. Jocelyn to come on up and I believe you're starting with our ELA curriculum update.

Dr.ileen

Jackson- Alright, good morning good evening everyone.

Thank you so Sarah claim our elementary early coordinator will be doing that update.

with me and so I want to say thank you too.

Many of the people who actually took. took a leading role in piloting one of the three programs that we were considering.

So this presentation is basically to provide as much information in detail to the community and the school committee regarding the process that we followed that resulted in the selection of a very valuable elementary reading program.

Admittedly, it is on the longer side, and the reason for that is because we want it to be as transparent as possible in providing as much information as possible with all the data that we've collected through surveys so that the whole community can have a level of confidence that there was adequate due diligence made in the selection of this program so that we share as much information as possible.

So I'd like to transition to Sarah who can take us to the next steps and she and I will go back and forth in terms of sharing some of the slides.

Thank you, Dr. Jocelyn.

I'm really excited to be here to share where we are in our process with all of you. And I want to echo what Dr. Jocelyn just said. This doesn't happen without a lot of people.

And so the first group that we need to thank tonight is our elementary ELA committee, Amy Gallagher, Emily Kerr, Stella Marengos, Jennifer McLaughlin-Spence, Catron O'Rourke, Margaret Rodero, and Katie Walker-Nankin.

They represent all three schools in a variety of roles and grade levels.

And they have put in so much time and been so dedicated to this process over the last almost two years now. And so I'm really, really grateful to them them. They've all piloted.

They have helped present PD. They've just done a tremendous job. It also doesn't help without the support of our administrators.

Very happy to have partnered with Dr. Jocelyn on this, but also do have had the support of our elementary principals, of Dr. Botello, of Ellen, and of my colleague, Tina Kemp, who walked me through a pilot process and was able to share her expertise as well. We also owe a big thank you to our pilot teachers.

We're going to talk about the process in a minute. And as you know, from our previous visit at the end of October, we had just so many teachers across all three elementary schools that volunteered their time and their energy to be pilot teachers this year, 38 of them to be exact.

So again, we're representing all three schools in every grade, K to five, and the amount of time and dedication that these teachers put into learning something new, trying it out with their students, giving us their really valuable feedback.

We're very, very grateful to all of them.

So go ahead, Dr. Jocelyn.

So we're thinking in terms of like, why are we looking for a new ELA curriculum?

And so the last program we view for our reading at the elementary level was done in 2017. And since that time, there's been updated research, empirically validated research into the different components of reading that makes for effective instruction.

For example, the importance of phonics and really direct instruction of phonics and skills like phonemic awareness, which is the understanding of sounds, how they associate to make up words, vocabulary instruction for language comprehension.

So all of this, we needed to really be up to date in the latest research so that the program that we're using, that we had some level of certainty that it incorporates and embeds the latest research in reading and what's effective.

So we had set some very specific criteria for selecting the new curriculum, for reading.

The first one, obviously, was that it needed to be aligned to the Massachusetts curriculum frameworks, because that's what the state, you know, the common core standards, making sure that it all fits within that framework.

We also looked at some of the high quality instructional materials that the Department of Education has published that they've vetted.

And that's important because if we were to ever pursue additional grants and funding for literacy, the first prerequisite will be that the district has adopted a high quality instructional material that DESE or the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has vetted.

We also, obviously, as I mentioned before, wanted to make sure that the program that we use, you know, have embedded within them validated research-based instructional practices.

We also wanted to make sure, because we are a culturally diverse community, that whatever program that we have in the reading materials are also culturally proficient, are also culturally proficient, and that it's engaging for all students, not wanting that any of our students be bored, essentially.

We also wanted to make sure that there's a clear scope and sequence, and that with opportunities to intersect with social studies and science, so that students can learn science concepts in their reading classes in their reading classes as well, we also wanted to make sure that whatever program we select make good use of technology, we also wanted to make good use of technology, and that also the materials and the consumables and the teacher guides are also available in digital formats for easy access for our instructional assistants, special ed staff, and general ed staff as well. We also wanted to make sure that they have embedded assessments that can inform instruction and to make sure that teachers can then use homogeneous grouping for their small group instruction based on the skill deficits that each student presents.

We also wanted to make sure that we also wanted to make sure that we also wanted to make sure that there are opportunities for enrichment for those kids who are performing at higher level.

And also, we are, you know, and Dr. Botello has championed the whole concept of student-centered learning and universal design for learning.

This is one thing we've been focusing on. We also wanted to make sure that whatever program that we select embed these practices as well. And the last set of criteria and probably one of some of the most important pieces, and these were non-negotiables for us to make sure that whatever resource that we or curriculum that we select has strong support for special education students and our English language learners.

So what that means is we wanted to make sure that the program that we use has a read aloud component.

What that means is that the, you know, using like a smart board, if there's a reading passage, not only the students have the reading passage in their consumables, they can read on their own, but also part of the practice will be that the teacher can simply hit play. And while the whole class is listening, the computer reads that passage for the students, which then allows students who may have some difficulty decoding or have some reading, learning disability, can actually hear the content and have access to it for comprehension purposes.

And it also removes any of the stigma that could take place in having a child go to a corner with a headset and listening to the material.

So it normalizes the process of reading out loud.

We also wanted to make sure that the programs have visual aids and graphic organizers.

So, for example, often elementary students have to read a passage and then they have to answer a guided question, which is called a reading response.

And some students who, you know, have certain learning disabilities or learn differently may need some kind of graphic organizer where they can actually break down their thoughts.

So we wanted something that, a program that embeds those practices and provide the teachers with those graphic organizers.

What that does, same thing again, it normalizes those accommodations so that those accommodations, the visual aids and graphic organizers are essentially available to all students.

And it also makes life much easier for our special ed teachers and staff. We also wanted, for our special ed students and English language learners, a system where they can type and complete their assignments digitally without having, if they have a hard time writing by hand so that they have options.

And obviously, especially for English language learners, opportunities to develop speaking and listening skills. A lot of the programs that we were looking at, we looked at would, for example, pre-teach the vocabulary words that students will encounter during, as they read passages.

And also, obviously, differentiation, meaning adapting the instruction to meet the needs of specific students is an important component that we also wanted to make sure that whatever program we select would also have.

So a little bit of information once we had our criteria established on where we went through our process.

So the committee had originally begun as a pre-K to 12 committee in February of 2023. And last winter, winter 2024, the elementary committee, once those criteria were established, we really started meeting on our own so that we could start to review sample materials so that we could start to look for, you know, what resources were going to meet those criteria.

And so that was a lot of meetings, a lot of months.

And we ended up with three that we were selected for piloting this fall.

CKLA, which stands for Core Knowledge Language Arts, My View, and Witten Wisdom.

We recruited our teachers for piloting, as we already mentioned earlier, and had a really strong response.

We invited the pilot teachers to come to a training the last week of August.

Each company provided us with materials for the pilot and also training.

We had really high attendance for that.

We began that pilot in September.

And right away, you know, we're getting feedback informally through teachers, but also periodically we're surveying them, asking the same questions of all three programs so that we would really be able to compare, you know, against our list of criteria.

What were they finding? What was their experience?

And as you know from our previous visit, we did conclude that My View was not going to be a feasible option for Sharon, and we did end that pilot early.

As we continued with the pilots for CKLA and Witten Wisdom, we arranged for visits to local school districts that are using both of these programs.

We took a team of teachers and administrators.

Some were the same people for both schools and some were different.

We were able to include pilot teachers for both programs in those visits.

Dr. Jocelyn, Dr. Botello came with us as well.

And I think those were really helpful as they provided us opportunities to go into classrooms where these programs are being used and see them in action in another district that had been using them for a while. And also, both schools set up opportunities for us to ask questions, which was extremely helpful.

And I know Dr. Jocelyn agrees with me that we really thank our colleagues in Easton and Quincy for being so welcoming to us. We used time at the data collaboration meetings so that all teachers, not just those who were piloting, could learn about these two programs, see the sample materials, explore the digital platform.

So this was at every grade at all three elementary schools.

We used one week to look at Witten Wisdom and one week to look at CKLA. After those meetings, teachers had access to demo accounts for the digital platforms if they wanted to explore on their own.

We also suggested sample lessons at each grade level in case they wanted to try one out.

We also arranged for administrative walkthroughs of pilot classrooms.

So a group of us going together to classrooms and seeing our pilot teachers conducting lessons and then being able to discuss what we saw, what we observed, what questions we had. And then in the first week of December, we sent out our final feedback forms to pilot teachers, but also sent out feedback forms to other stakeholder groups. So this included all other teaching staff, parents and guardians of students in pilot classrooms, and the students themselves.

So those were actually some of my favorite responses, what the kids had to say.

And once we, our committee got all of that feedback and compiled it and looked through it, we made a recommendation and our administrators that we would move forward with CKLA as the resource for sharing.

So to give you a little bit of how we got there, these are the participation rates from those feedback forms in December.

So we had 100% response from our pilot teachers for both programs.

We received 26 responses from classroom teachers who weren't piloting one of those two programs and 19 responses from other teaching staff, such as special educators, EL teachers, literacy specialists.

From families, we received 78 responses in total.

Our K-2 students completed our feedback form as a class.

We had teachers ask the questions and have the kids raise their hands.

So we had 100% participation from those classrooms.

And then our grade three, four, and five students completed their form individually.

And so we had 217 responses total.

So really high rates, really, for all of these.

And so what the forms really told us when we looked at our piloting teachers, 83% of our CKLA piloting teachers said their students were highly engaged with the curriculum.

That number was only 33% for wit and wisdom.

And I'll just add here that that talk of high engagement from the students was present in the CKLA classrooms from day one. It was a very common thing for me to hear from the CKLA pilot teachers, how much the kids were talking about it, how they were using the vocabulary.

And so it was high on the very first survey that we did of the pilot teachers for CKLA, and it stayed that way all the way through.

I'm not going to necessarily go through every number here, but as you can see, the numbers for CKLA were quite a bit higher in pretty much every category, from the ease of use of the materials, both print and digital, as well as with the pacing.

You know, anytime you're trying something new, it goes slower at first.

And so, you know, the first feedback forms at the end of September, beginning of October, everyone was saying, I'm not quite getting through a lesson a day. And we were saying, that's fine. We expected that.

And where we are now, several months in, is, you know, just about half of our pilot teachers saying, nope, I'm getting here. The pacing's good. It's making sense.

We still weren't there with wit and wisdom with only 17% of our teachers saying that the pacing was accurate.

These are a few comments from our piloting teachers for CKLA that I think, again, kind of really sum up a lot of what we heard throughout the process this fall.

You know, with the middle ages unit that the fourth graders just did, you know, talking about kids finishing their work at a faster pace because they were excited to share their opinion.

And I think this final quote, I've been teaching and sharing for 30 years, and this is the most engaged I ever remember my students.

I think that's really, really a powerful one that we wanted to share with you. And we also surveyed teachers who didn't pilot any of the three programs.

And, you know, obviously they were all exposed to information about both programs, CKLA, Wisdom, and earlier on, My View. And these were essentially the strength that they identified for each of the two programs that were the finalists, you know, that both were engaging, but CKLA more so.

CKLA had well-structured lessons, which is also helpful for teachers.

And, you know, the digital platform was easy to navigate, which was important because that would be available to other staff.

So we want to make sure that they would be able to find what they need using those. So as you could see, we really gathered all of the data, all of the comments, and a lot of those themes emerged from the piloting of these, from the teachers who didn't pilot.

We also surveyed parents to get a sense of their children's experience with CKLA and WIT and Wisdom.

And again, as Sarah indicated earlier, the positive feedback from CKLA was much higher than WIT and Wisdom.

So 63% of parents, for example, thought the pilot was a positive experience for their child.

44% could understand their child's progress in reading versus 35% and 37% respectively for WIT and Wisdom.

So then we get to what the kids had to say. So for our K-2 students, as I said, you know, we had the teacher ask the question and have the kids, you know, raise their hands.

So out of, you know, the pilot classrooms, 70% of our students said they felt happy or excited when it was time for ELA.

That's a really high number for our classroom versus 36% for WIT and Wisdom.

You know, the other two numbers I actually feel are good indicators for both programs.

You know, 88% feeling they've improved this year and 69%, you know, again, those are still high numbers.

Yes, it's higher for CKLA, but I'm still really delighted to hear that so many students felt that they had improved themselves as readers and writers with WIT and Wisdom. And then in grades three to five, again, you can see here that, you know, interest and how they felt about it was higher with CKLA.

And also with what they were learning, 88% saying they're learning a lot of new information and vocabulary versus 75%. Again, still a high number.

And it's great to hear that.

These are both knowledge building curriculums.

So they really are centered around kids, you know, learning content and learning vocabulary.

So it was good to see those high numbers.

And again, 96% feeling they've improved in reading and 91%, you know, we were really happy to see both of those.

But again, the numbers just slightly tip into CKLA's favor there.

So what is CKLA?

As I said before, it stands for Core Knowledge Language Arts. It's published by Amplify.

As a knowledge building curriculum, it's organized into a number of different units at each grade that cover domains in literature, science, and social studies.

So these are just a few examples of some of the units that our students have been exploring or will explore this year and beyond.

And there is some overlap to Massachusetts science and social studies standards.

They don't align perfectly.

But we're still seeing kids are going to build just a lot of background knowledge in a lot of areas.

And there's also grade to grade there is building.

So there's like, for example, you see the five senses there.

That's a kindergarten unit. But in first grade, they do a human body unit. And then they do a human body unit again in third grade where they're learning about, you know, building off the five senses. Like they learn about the skeletal system or the muscular system or things like that or ways to stay healthy.

There's an animals unit in almost every grade. So again, it's building across grade levels, which is nice to see, too.

In grades K to 2, the literacy lessons are divided into two components.

One is the knowledge base, which will, you know, really be where they'll build that background knowledge, vocabulary, work on comprehension, write in response to what they're reading.

Those lessons are delivered through read aloud, as Dr. Jocelyn said. So the teacher is reading the content to the class and pausing to ask questions and introduce the vocabulary words and have students turn and talk and all of those things.

And then there's a skills component.

This is the phonics piece of the lessons.

So currently, the district uses foundations in grades K to 3 as our phonics program, our structured phonics program.

With the purchase of CKLA, we will be switching to teach this through skills, the CKLA skills program.

It is different from foundations and that foundations is a really a syllable based approach.

So students learn different syllable types and the different rules that govern them.

With CKLA, it takes more of a sound based approach.

And so right away from kindergarten, students are learning the different sounds and learning how to blend them and segment them.

And what we've seen this year in the kindergarten classrooms that are piloting is that our students were tapping and reading simple CVC words as early as November, whereas with foundations, they don't actually typically get to that until much later in the school year.

So we're excited about that and we're excited about what we're seeing there. The other big difference, I would say, between the skills of CKLA and the foundations approach is the emphasis on decoding.

Foundations is a very strong emphasis on encoding or spelling.

And that's the biggest way that the kids show that they're understanding syllable types and the rules. So we've got to be able to do that. With CKLA skills, starting about mid-year through kindergarten, but then for the rest of that year and in first and second grade, each skills unit comes with a student reader that is decodable text directly aligned to the skills that they are learning in that unit.

And these are good texts, like decodable texts.

There's all kinds on the market and some are much better quality than others. These ones, like they look like real books that kids want to read.

And so we've really been enjoying seeing those come and seeing our students have that practice with decoding just as much with encoding.

So we do feel that that's been a little bit of a missing piece.

In the upper grades, there's one literacy block every day and all components are integrated.