Okay, thank you. So Deputy Secretary, you are here today to talk to us about the SLDS. Yes. I am indeed. Okay, great. Yes, we've been wondering about this. We've been hearing a few things about this. Sure, so. Reading a few things about it. Reading a few things about it as well, yes. For the record, Deputy Secretary Heather Boucher, Agency of Education. Thank you, Chair Webb and committee members. It's a pleasure to be here this morning. I am indeed here to speak about the statewide long-term data system, provide you all with an update. That's what SLDS stands for. I will try to keep the acronyms at a minimum. Just explain them if you could. If I forget, please ask. Because I think those new to the committee are realizing what acronym land really looks like once you delve into education. We might be the best at that. I do want to also introduce Deputy Secretary for the Agency of Digital Services, Sean Naylor, who is here as well. And Brad, what is your official title other than like finance guru of the world? The official title is Education Finance Manager. Education Finance Manager, Brad James, who will testify after me about some specifics with respect to financial questions that I believe may have arisen as a result of the SLDS, but I'm not entirely sure. And I will also rely if it's okay, Madam Chair, with on these two individuals, if we get, I get some specific questions about fiscal details or intricate information technology, IT details, that I'll probably try to answer, but. Ms. Do, do you want them to sit with you? I don't think so. Is it okay if they're needed though? I'll call them up. Is that okay? Because I think we'll do fine. It's just for added texture and context, isn't it? I also wanted to start with a humorous note that I seem to have picked up a cold since I last saw you. Sorry about that. I will try to keep it, my sentence over here, Dylan. I'd also note that I was just fine until I started coming over to this place, but some of you may be sitting as well, I don't know. Okay. So, here is the most fun slide for my presentation. It's a very technical presentation. I want to just capture you with some bright colors to make sure we're all awake. So, if you're not aware, some of you will already be. We received a federal grant from the US Department of Education back in 2012, which was, which was the second request for proposals. We actually were unsuccessful in our first request from the feds to actually help state agencies across the nation invest more technology and build robust capacity, more automaticity in terms of how data are collected, managed and actually reported in education state agencies. So, it's been a long process. We first got that grant in 2012, as you can see. The bulk of the nearly $5 million that we got went toward a project called the Vermont Automated Data Reporting, VADR project. For some of us, also a note of humor. The acronym means some different things, given that it's VADR, given how long we've been working on this for a long time. I'm glad some of you are smiling. Star Wars fans would know what I'm talking about. So, there were several specific deliverables that were required for meeting the goals of the grant. And I'm happy to say that we have actually met all of these deliverables. So, we do have a functional vertical data collection process. It has been built. It actually is in operation. We have built the operational data store, the capacity for it. We also do have tool data loads automated for analytics. We have established an enhanced train delivery system. Early on, this was a series of wikis and webinars for the field to view and look at. But more recently, and I'll go further with the presentation, because we are delayed, we have done a lot more hands-on training and tried to be much more systematic about that in the field during the last, I would say, six months, actually. Our EDFAC submission files, which are the core files that have to get reported by all state agencies to the Federal Department of Education, are now capable of being automatically generated. And we are not quite done with the growth model reporting tool, but have made significant progress on it. Just a definition, can you just in a nutshell explain what an automatic vertical data collection process is? I'm gonna get into that. So, it's all of this, which I know is highly technical. The rest of the presentation is actually gonna be in plain English. Okay, now that's okay. I just wanted to. I have to backwards a little bit. Thank you so much. But, and I'm sorry, I don't have your name. I'm Sarita Austin. Hi, my name is Rep. Representative Austin. If something isn't clear, though, please stop me. And because I definitely want to make sure this is clear and in plain English. So, if after the plain English is shared, if it still doesn't make sense, please let me know. Can you open the purpose here? The purpose of this change? Yes. Oh, that's kind of weird. Okay. So, why don't we just be quiet for a minute? Okay. I thought about, should I go into the, I just wanted to get the nitty gritty. Like, we are actually, we have met our deliverables check. So, what I also was going to say though, that that is technical. So, we've met the technical deliverables always with any project, the devil is in the details. And that's what you've been hearing a lot about and that's what I'm gonna talk about a lot more. So, there are three components to any system like this and a lot of IT systems. Data collection, data arrangement organization and then data visualization or output. And I'm gonna talk a little bit more about each of those. So, that actually is what we're investing in. A system that when it's done fully, allows us to do those three different things in a much more streamlined, much more systematic, meaning all schools are looking the same in terms of the process, which really hasn't been the case until now. What's allows us to compare and contrast? Well, we always could do some comparing contrast, but it was a lot more difficult and more time consuming to actually get the data in the way we needed to to do those comparisons. So, when this is actually complete, it allows us to have more kind of like one click functionality. The challenge is setting it all up to get the one click functionality has been like where the real work has been and why it's taken so long. So, the first piece is data collection and that's called vertical reporting in the state launch tunnel data system. So, it's really about and what the vertical piece means is how is each system at the local level getting the required data to the state agency? So, all states have to deal with some kind of vertical reporting. The way they actually have set it up might be different. For instance, in some states, which we weren't really ready for as our state, they might have said, we're going to one statewide system. Everyone's going to use at the local level the same data collection tool, the same fields, the same everything and it's going into one systematic sort of model of the state agency. We weren't ready. I wasn't around. We didn't decide to do that in our state for probably very good reasons, I can imagine. And so, we still have a bit of the wild west at the local level. So, we have a lot of different types of data collection products and vendors. And so, part of the challenge, as you're going to see, is that we've tried to, what we're doing is actually setting this state agency level unitary new product and trying to talk to all these different kinds of systems that are still out there at the local level. How many different systems are you trying to get? There's at least three, but I would probably say five or six because there's a couple. I mean, there was six of them. There were six. Three. Three main. I do know some of them, so yeah. Three main systems, but then a couple of systems. Well, three main like PowerSchool, Infinite Campus, is that one? And, VCAP, that's more of a, is that the right? No, that's the integrator in between. Okay. The Tyler? Tyler. So, these are. Can you just state your names of the record? Oh, sorry. No, you have to recognize your voice. Yep, Sean, the other deputy secretary in C Digital Services. Thank you. My bad. So, I kind of jumped into that in the second point that there have been, there's a variety of local systems. Local entities make choices based on their fiscal situation, their comfort, their trust on which vendors they want to go to, longstanding patterns of who they've worked with. One of the pieces though that's really critical is there's also a real difference in capacity at the local level. So, some, and you're gonna see that in the data, so some LEAs, local education agencies, were able to pretty quickly jump into this work and now they've been kind of waiting a while because they were able, they have more capacity, they have perhaps more sophisticated staff that they've been able to hire. They were able to do this pretty quickly, moved to the new system. Others either, I mean, variety of reasons. Employee transition, changes in local vendor contracting situation, and maybe having a bit of transition around which vendor they were gonna use, not everyone stayed with the same vendor. Cost has been an issue for some. Those are the reasons in some sense where we are today because what's, so the system itself is built, but what's the problem right now is we're still waiting for some of the data to come in. So just to put that kind of in a nutshell, and we're very close. And I think that's actually something that we're pretty excited about because we've really put in a lot of effort during the past couple of months to make sure that we can finally get this over the finish line. So just to reiterate, what we're talking about is everyone, the state, including state employees, was adopting a new system, new product system with HMH, Howard and Mifflin Harcourt, some of you might remember that used to be a textbook publishing company and now it's, well, parts of it did. Now it's actually in IT space as are Pearson and some others. We also, because of our ESSA state plan, have moved to reporting at the district or SU level and that's different and that's created some strain at the local level and that was required as a function of our ESSA plan. So it used to be that schools could just directly upload data. They were flat files, it was a very old sort of fashion system, but having it now have to go through that district level has created a bit of just transition and challenge for some folks to actually get on the same page. So they might have to make sure, for instance, if their business managers were doing this work, that all the business managers are on the same page. Some in some SUs it was a business manager in one school and data, a education technology individual in another school and so they've had to do a lot of integration such as that with staffing. And then the bottom line is there has been and was needed a significant level of coordination and then frontline training for both schools and our state staff, as I mentioned. So in some that's kind of giving you a sense of what it is and this is the piece that the bulk of the work has been on because we did not have a vertical reporting system that passed muster with the feds, which is why we actually got the grant. So again, just to reiterate, this is actually, I mean, we literally have a handful of schools that are actually working today right now to actually get this data up. And then we'll need a little bit more time to do the next piece, which is the data arranging and organizing. But we are very confident that in the spring we will have the report card, we will have the schools identified and all that kind of stuff done. So the original thing that it was supposed to be available, the report card. Fall. It was supposed to be this fall available, but you're saying that they will be available in the spring. Yes. And we are okay with the feds on that? We are. We, so just to be clear about that, so we did miss our state deadline that was in our state plan because it was fall, 2018. But the federal government has not, the federal US DOE has not taken a hard stance on that. In fact, it actually, there was no deadline imposed in the actual statute, the SS statute. The reason, there was no deadline imposed in the federal statute. Because it was just an agreement between the, It was an agreement and even more specifically, what had happened is in the previous presidential administration under Obama, the rules and regulations from the US Department of Education had specified by December. And so we ran with that by fall. We wanted to have it in a little bit earlier. But all of those rules and regulations were actually rescinded with the committee because they felt that not this particular piece, but lots of the other rules and regulations weren't overreach by the US DOE. These were rescinded as federal. Yes. So what stands now is the statute, the committee, Lamar Alexander's committee on education. They said that there had been an overreach in terms of the rules and regulations by the US Department of Education. So they said, kind of back to the drawing board, we're not gonna hold states accountable. The actual committee that wrote the bill and that actually the bill came from, we're not gonna hold the states accountable for the specifics of those rules and regulations. We are held accountable though for what's in the actual federal statute. And that's what I'm saying. There isn't a particular deadline. Does that mean that we're thrilled and happy? No, we wanna get this done. And so I'm here to actually assure the committee that we're working as hard as we can. We're not thrilled that we're late. There's a lot of reasons and I'll talk about those in a minute. But again, I am, we are very confident that this will be the SLDS and the data will actually be complete and the identifications for federal purposes for title allocations and for the school state report card will definitely be finished in the spring. So the second piece, sort of if you think about this, it's kind of like data comes in, in the middle, there's all this data arranging and querying and matching data together across different types of files, matching student level data with school level data and district level data. There's, there's some verification of the data. So for instance, what we're talking about right now for the reporting is making sure that the system actually runs. So our, you know, was the data that was put in actually, like will the system actually accept it? Now comes a piece, which is, and again, we've already built this into the new calculation, the new estimate for spring. Now comes staffing the agency saying like, okay, reaching back out to the schools as an example, reaching out to district. Did you really need to say that none of your seniors graduated last year because that's what your data shows. So other states, I will say, do not do this step. California, they say, it's on you. We don't have the capacity. Like what you put in is what you get. We have been a kind of gentler state and have built this in. And I do think as we move forward, we want to probably continue talking about that because it is a lot of wasted resources, quite frankly. And so we have a goal of helping the local education agencies do a better job of actually getting accurate. So how some of the states like that happen? Human error, usually, human error. Is it the newness of the system? No, no, this has been something that's been going on since the advent of technology and data. Other examples might be a student is, I don't know, miscoded. I was going to pick gender, but that's not really a good example. Just given that we have a lot of fluidity around gender now in our student population. But something that is a pretty permanent marker such as, let's say, age. So we collect age. And in some file, it says they're 10 and everything else says they're 12. There's a problem there. And so that's the kind of thing which would be, we think that this kid is 12, but can you correct that for us? Because the other point is we really can't, we can't do this data for the schools. That would be not okay. Like it has to come from them. Like we can't correct that data for them. Everyone understands why, right? Like it has to be their data that's then certified. Any other questions about that stuff? That is also going to be like a very automatic process. We are actually contracting with a new entity, C2, that will actually build a much more robust platform using SQL Server that will allow that middle management of the data, if you will, to be a much more automatic type of process. It's not currently there right now. So you're looking at one vendor. There's a variety of vendors. There's one vendor for the actual SLDS system. So we, but there's a, and this is where Sean can help me out, Deputy Secretary Nalert. So this C2 is actually helping the agency boost its sort of regular operating infrastructure by investing in SQL, another kind of IT product that will allow, Sean maybe you can speak to this, but my understanding is it will allow much more simple automated types of prepping up the data and then therefore analytics to be done. Sean Neller again, ADS. So what we have worked with the agency of education on is to bring in almost like a parallel in-house environment that works, that gives more robust tools to AOE staff to be able to do the data management and manipulation that needs to go on for things like suppression and normalization of the data validation. And it also is going to allow for other disparate data that may not be directly related to what's being captured if down the road there's a desire to do comparison reporting and stuff, this environment will allow that. So it's built on normal Microsoft technology. I know I'm geeking out, so I apologize. But it's just- I don't really understand Microsoft. So it's a base, what they call relational database management system. So it's just, it's the enterprise container that allows data to go in and manipulations and rearranging to happen in a way that is more sustainable for that work that needs to happen outside of the SLDS and where we've engaged is with the company C2 out of the Burlington area that is helping with coming in and ramping up both AOE and ADS staff that is in the education agency to be able to not only build this out themselves but build upon it and maintain it moving forward. What he said, see? Yeah, I'm just wondering what resources and training schools does this have to guarantee the validity of the data they're entering? I actually have brought a handout and it's in my bag. So we have provided a series of workshops, get-togethers, phone calls, like actually on the phone like for many hours, like working with folks to continue to do that. The vendors themselves, so those local vendors that they've contracted with, they also have the specs. So they're supposed to be able to, most of them are able to actually work with the local staff to get what they need. But again, given some of those capacity issues, we have had to really help out at the agency level. After the local one? Yes, yes. And then of course, doing that work has had an impact on the capacity of the agency. So for instance, as I think you know, some of our reports are somewhat delayed because we've got the same people working on data for the reports as doing this work. And that will continue. So, and I'll show you a little bit about sort of like what the impact of that help has been so far, which I'm pretty pleased about. And then the data visualization piece really has to do with what I think folks here, the committee is most interested in, at least not for this kind of conversation, but for the typical conversations we have in terms of making policy decisions. So, what are the data actually tell us? What are the, how do we interpret what is going on? How do we organize it visually to understand it better? What patterns can we detect? What we're doing now, as you might have heard about is the state report card. Also funded through the ESSA allotment and required by ESSA legislation. And I also have some handouts on that as well. I'm happy to come back and do a presentation if you all would like on ESSA and the snapshot, but there's just not enough time to go into it today. But that, if you can think of it as like that's the pretty part of data that actually shows you in late person's terms what is actually going on with our data. So I'm kind of jumping around from nitty gritty to middle to voila, which is what I think we're all most excited about, is that last piece. Questions on that so far? So I did mention that there have been some delays. We want to be quite open and honest about that. There has been a rollout in this final push. We are now sort of in this, you know, moving definitely across the finish line because there has been a delay in the past year. We did have some challenges with the contract with the one entity that designed the SLDS. As I said, their HMH, which is this big model with organization, company, for-profit company, and at points they were kind of like, ah, we're not sure. And we actually, we're not sure we want to continue to do the work, but we worked with them and they continue to. This happens a fair amount for us because we're such a small state and it happens. And I mean you can probably speak to this, Sean. Sometimes when we want to have the very best which we deserve, we get the very best, but sometimes, I mean there's often a lot of transition in the IT space in terms of these products and sometimes when there has been a transition, leadership of those companies will be like, why do we want to, maybe we should just, you know, cut our losses and pull out because we're not, we're doing all this work for this teeny little contract for them, which is a huge contract for us, but it's a teeny little contract. So some understanding was you had a vendor but that vendor was bought by another vendor. Yes. Right, so all of a sudden. So there was some multi-billion dollar corporation that was dealing with our little. Yes, but we worked it out, but that did create some delay and some momentary panic because it was really, you know, we were wondering what the heck we would do. I think two years ago, do you recall? That was part of my moment, it was two years ago. It was when Secretary Holcomb was managing the agency, but I'm pretty sure it was two years ago. It wasn't in the last year that she was there. There was some delay with vendor contracts in terms of ensuring that again, these local vendors would actually be set up to help do the work. There were some delays there. They've now been squared away. There were some delays in getting the specs out to the field. I think because of the delay in vendor contracts, some of this actually is a domino effect. And then the other piece, which I did want to make sure I bring to the committee's attention is we have had, and certainly Deputy Naylor is very aware of, we have had for reasons that were really not in a lot of our control, multiple IT systems that had to actually be renewed, updated, transformed at the same time. A grants management system that had the previous product was actually like going out of business and there was going to be no more support for it as I understand the, what's the acronym for the chart of accounts? SSDMS, is that, did I get it right? SSDMS, I don't know. SSDMS, I don't know if I have it right, but it's the Uniform Chart of Accounts that I think was needed and then also supported here by the legislature. I know I'm forgetting another one that was a pretty, and these are big asks on the same local entities that are trying to work on the SLDS. So that's actually why I'm talking about this. The Chart of Accounts is under the same? Yes, so in many places, for instance, the business manager would be working with others to actually, in the old system, it would have been the business manager or someone in the business manager's team, like if there were a registrar, for instance, that was actually uploading the data. Again, now, because we've moved to an SU data collection system, they are involved, but not, you know, there was some transition there, but they're definitely involved in the Unified Uniform Chart of Accounts. So Chart of Accounts is a systematic way to track, through Uniform Codes, track what dollars are being spent on. So, and here's where Brad, James, could perhaps jump in, but my understanding is much as we have had in some of the other conversation pieces I brought up, we have had a history of very different types of financial reports coming in or different categories meeting different things across schools and across districts, and so this is a way to say everyone's on the same page, so we know what the personnel line means for everyone, just as a very broad example, and I don't know if there's some other examples, Brad, that you want to actually point out. I'm sure I'm butchering this. I think the name's A to C Education for the record. You've got the general gist of it, correct? There were a number of systems out there that didn't talk to each other, and they all had to report to us. Business managers wanted to have something more that was a common thing. There's still going to be differences, because they're still going to interpret things differently, but it's going to be much better than it had been in the past once it's all organized and straightened out. And where are we in time into that? The Uniform Charter of Counts. It's being implemented right now by some districts. It's kind of a stage process, the way it's set up, along with the financial management system that Heather was talking about, the SSD, DMS. It's being phased in. I think there's a number that are supposed to go live July 1, and then there are others who are going to go probably, I would say maybe within a year after July 1. I'm not sure what the exact final date is, but it's beautiful. How many do you think will be ready by July 1? I think there are 40 in there. I don't think they'll all be ready by July 1, and that's something that the conversations we're having in the background. Is that 40 out of? 40 out of, currently now we're at 53 SUs. We've had two or three go live already, another one. I think two are live already. Two are about to go live, and then we've got the next big block. A lot of them went because they're getting unlimited support from the provider power school. Just to follow up, I think I'll point out, and the Uniform Charter of Counts effort is wholly separate from the SLVS. Yes. In future, the plan is that they could talk better to each other, but that's not part of, I believe, that's not part of the work plan right now because we first got to get these kind of substrates nailed down, the actual products themselves. So I already talked about this, but the result of this is that we had an initial deadline of fall 2018, and now we're looking at sometime this spring. I just want to end my formal testimony by giving you a snapshot of what this has looked like, and I've mentioned a couple of times the hard work of our core staff. They have been, frankly, I've never seen such an incredibly hardworking staff in my entire career. They have been putting in tons of overtime, foregoing vacation around the holidays, things that kind of break my heart, but that's how committed they are to doing this work. So when we started looking at, okay, we're not actually meeting the deadline that we need, we started actually getting daily updates on what was happening at, and these are numbers of districts. And so as you can see in that first column, well, as you can see on the top row, this is tracking the number of districts that had not submitted anything to the SLDS. The number who had submitted, but there were errors, and again, this is errors in the SLDS, so it wasn't running properly. And then those that were certified are ready to be certified. Ready to be certified means that someone on the LEA, it's all been cleared by the agency. Someone on the LEA just needs literally, again, to press a button and say, we're done. So we count that as pretty much ready. Yeah, I just want to start off. We often go around, branch like that, SUs, the districts. It's both, so it's- Well, if I may, it's really at the supervised reunion level. What causes part of the confusion is there's supervisory districts, which are subset. It's a, but when we're saying districts- So we don't have, is a, we don't have East Montpelier elementary school as a district. You have Washington and Central. Correct, thank you. So these are the operating districts or operating issues, which I think is clarification. Thank you for forcing me to remember that all the time representative partner. So as you can see, we had a substantial amount back in November that had not submitted. We had a chunk that were, had that the state agency and the vendor had noted errors. And so that automatically leads to a system of communications back and forth with the LEA to actually fix that, go back and resubmit. And then as you can see, we did have some who were ready. And I think that's actually important to point out as well that we did have somebody mentioned this earlier that some of the systems that had more robust capacity were able to, like this was pretty easy for them. They were able to use the guidance that was provided and get that done. Does this tend to be the larger districts? You know, it's been interesting. We thought that when I went and looked at it, but no, part of it has been, again, those local decisions about what they were doing with vendors. So for instance, a couple of them were our larger systems that were actually struggling because they had decided for a variety of reasons that they were going to like go with a new vendor for like a transition period and then go back to a different vendor like for a spring, for instance, spring census and then they had a different one for fall. I know that there's one, for instance, that they would have a different one for the fall of the tuition census. By the way, I've mapped these out on the left hand column. These are the different data collection. We call them data collection. So it's a group of particular types of information that are required either by federal or by state law to be collected at these times. So they're very time bound. So the end of year, formerly called the spring census, we're still collecting data on that and that's from last spring. The reason that one's critical is because of that is what informs much of the state report card and much of the identification issues that are actually delayed, as I talked about. It's also, the reason it's taken so long, even though it's kind of like the first data, is because it has a much bigger number of data files. It's a bigger data collection. And so because of that, there's been more opportunity for errors, those kinds of things. So even though chronologically, it actually makes sense that it would be completed the first. It's more difficult. And because it was started first, it actually allowed, we believe, the tuition student census and the ADM census to be actually completed a little bit more quickly because they got kind of a taste, even though it might not have been fully resolved, they were still working on the spring. They got a taste of what the system looked like. They were able with a more simple set of data collection requirements to kind of like pop up those others. So the thing that I'm really excited about is so as of the 23rd, everyone has submitted. Every single operating district or SU has submitted their data. I'm looking at this, where is that? I say everybody has submitted. So there are zero under not submitted now. So, yeah, I'm sorry. I need a point. Yeah, can I just finish this one piece? And we've now significantly, I could have, if you're interested, I can give you all the intermediate details. I'm just trying to go from point A to point B. We've now also really hammered away at these errors. And as you can see, we're very strong in terms of who's done. So we really, like for that spring census, we have, I believe it's now nine that are actually working on really getting the errors. And those are the systems that they're really getting a handhold from our core staff daily connection. Like how's it going? Can I help you? That kind of stuff. So I really, and then for the other two, there's just one SU. They happen to be different. But each of them, there's just one. And it might even be by Monday that those are done. And so we really do feel, as I said, very confident given this that we will be just fine in the spring. Representative Elder? I was just curious. Why are there 57 districts in the top lines and 53 in the others? A little thing called Act 46. Yeah, I was wondering. It just was surprising to me that we're going up in districts as the dates get later. I would have thought that it would have gone the other. So we've got, on one of these, it seems like the, maybe I've got it right. Anyway, can you explain that? Yeah, this is spring last year. Oh, that spring is before the fall. So it's 57. Got it, okay. These last two were from this fall. And so those are 53. So we've shrunk. We've, as the supervised unions have been shrinking a little bit. And 53 is the number now, is that right? As of this year, yeah. As of this year, there will be some others. There will be 52 at least next year. Yeah. Okay, thanks. What's the none of us, did you have a question? Do you know? Not yet. I will. We can count on it. Okay, go ahead, thank you. Oh, we're in question. I'm wondering about do you have capacity to see this through? Do you have the state dollars to see this through? Where are we in terms of resources? Yeah, I think, as I mentioned earlier, we have formed a very strong partnership with leadership at the Agency of Digital Services. We've invested in some additional project management resources. And so I don't think we're in dire straits fiscally. And I think, again, we really are in that final push. So I think we're okay. I think we have augmented staff as we've needed to and haven't actually had to come back to the legislature for additional resources fiscally on that. As you know, the amount of time it can take to actually hire a new person is tough. Particularly, I mean, we were talking to you a couple of days ago, Secretary French and I about the skilled workforce. And this is a quite skilled project. It requires significant skill. Interestingly, we actually have, one of the things I'm really proud of, this has been a really hard slog and we have, there has been no turnover in this team in the Agency, which I cannot say for some of the other programmatic teams in the past couple of years. So this team, the data team is stable? Oh, marvelously stable. They consider themselves a family. They're pretty amazing. I don't know, would you agree? I'm sorry. I'm sorry, you cannot agree. You cannot agree with that, that's right.  Right. We did not do that to you guys. We know how valuable a few cloth are. He is an extremely valuable member of this team. Questions? Representative Cousins? So, what we sort of hear, what we hear locally, the issue is equalized pupils. This falls into that. Brad and I chatted a little bit about this earlier, and so if we are lacking just one school district to get their information correct, where are we on equalized pupils? Number one, and number two, if we were having so much trouble getting equalized pupil numbers out this year, was it, do we have the same situation last year, and if not, why didn't we just sort of go back and use last year's method and kind of get it better? So, those are three questions. But I also think that's, if I may just, I just want to tell me the story about the white circles. Perfect segue, representative Conlon to why Brad is here. Perfect. I believe that's the microphone's a little bit better. That's why. I'm here if you have additional questions about the teacher. Yeah, yeah, we will switch. Switch a room. Again, Brad James, A&C of Education, officially at the chair now. Hot seat, yes. I was just throwing on my last one. Yeah, I don't know you guys well enough. Some of you I do. So, all right, let's, let's, where are we? The secretary, the secretary of Boucher showed that there were 52 SUs in for the, both the fall, the fall students, public student census and the tuition census. Both those drive equalized pupils. There's one that still work on errors. Actually quite a few are actually working on errors because what happens is once they're certified, I see the data, I send it back out to people and they go, uh-oh, that's not right. We're missing X number of students here. I don't see these people here. So this is still an, and it's still working. It looks like on the gross numbers by certification, it does look like we're close to being, we are getting close, far closer than we have been in the past, as was said. But we're not there yet. I sent out version eight of equalized pupils yesterday. I think there was a version nine. Well, I think two cycles, if I sell version 9,321, I think that's what I called it. But it's really version six or seven. But I sent out version eight yesterday. There will be a version nine, unquestionably. And as I was looking at the data, I saw that most everybody's in because we've been missing two supervisor units for quite some time. They're both in at this point. So people are seeing their data now as it has been submitted and they're working on it. But there's still a tremendous number of errors between what I saw in version seven and what I saw in version eight in terms of just the ADM counts. This is the numbers that we're talking about here. So they're working, they're seeing it. But we're getting to the point now where I think I'm going to say, okay, two weeks from today, hard stuff, we're done. So that means everybody needs to look at their numbers right now. You need to look at all the problems, all the issues in there. You need to talk to IT people because it's the business managers and the registrars who know the kids. It's not the IT people. And that's where there's a bit of a disconnect. It's getting resolved. I don't think we'll have this issue next year or if we do it, Struggle won't be to the same degree by any means because people are working things out. But at this point, I think I'm going to the point where I'm going to say, okay, I'm going to freeze it here because everybody has now been in. You can all see what we've got. And so you need to work now. You need to be talking to your people. People keep asking, what do we do? I said, call the support desk. I don't know the answer, but they're working their way towards that. I think that's where we are. Last year we were using a different system. It was the old system. It kind of fell apart and we stopped. We didn't run in parallel. And we just went to this new one. It, obviously there are problems with it. The rollout was not smooth. We had, as again, as I said, we had different people running, pulling data out of Supervisor Union information systems, but they don't know the data. They don't know what's missing. They don't know what needs to be included. Some people did not realize that there were two sentences that needed to be input for the fall. So it's been an iterative process here trying to get people up to speed. It's not like people are not working though. I know what people have been doing. Some districts are a little bit slack, others are not. Very few are slack. So we're making progress, but again, as I said, we're getting there. So if you say in two weeks, then that will be a hard stop. I think so. This will be your number. Yeah, that's what I'm looking at right now based on what I saw yesterday. Okay. So I mean, I'll still be giving them information, but at some point we have to stop. And again, what I've sent out, we want to talk to you twice, people's how it all works. There's a whole harmless provision in it from the prior year. Right, okay, but that whole harmless is still, it's a different whole harmless than it used to be. Can you explain what the whole harmless is? Sure. You've all probably heard of Phantom students at some point, because just because. So when, the way the law used to read was that you could not, a district could not have fewer than 96.5% in order to drop 3.5% from the prior year's count. The prior year's count was a whole harmless count. So if in year one, the current year, a district had 100 kids, then I said, I'll tell you about 100 kids. If next year I did the calculation and they had 90 kids, then I can only drop them by 3.5% so they would have 96.5 is what it would appear. That difference between the 90 and the 96.5, six and a half, those are the phantoms. That's the whole harmless. What the law used to say then was in the second, third year whichever year we're on, next year out, if I calculate it and there were 80, I went 3.5% from the prior year's 96.5. So what happened was there's become a tail growing. The law. One district I think that had more phantoms than it was done in actual history. It was about 50% of them. Maybe 52% of them were from the prior year. Yeah, there was, and scary place. And then, sorry, the halls, the halls. But that led to all kinds of problems that I wasn't going to do. But the law got changed by Act 46 back in 2015 and there was a little bit of transition period. But now what's happening is, using the same example, 100 year one, 90 year two, they got 96.5. In year three, if they're at 80, I don't start at the 96.5, which was the whole harmless. I started for the last year's actual count of 90. So I dropped that by 3.5%. So there is still whole harmless, but there's no buildup of a tail. It's an annual thing. I lost what made me start, I just have to accept that you said what's whole harmless. I know, I'm starting. That's a very helpful lecture. Whole harmless, we only have one more year with that? No, no, it's ongoing. Districts that have chosen not to voluntarily merge do lose it, that we're not okay by the board. They will lose it. So they, I think it happens in 21. So I think it is one more year at this point. So at this point, we have more phantoms than we should right now because the EDM numbers are still not where I think they should be. So this affects, so if you have a district of 1,000 students and you lose three students, that's not that big a deal. But if you have 20 students, you have 20 students for 16. Okay, I get the other few of those.  It's a big deal. And it did lose what started us off on the whole house, and I apologize. I'm sure, what happened with that? We were talking about the new system rollout, we were talking about that you had gotten to version eight. And the question is how, what's the flip? How, I've heard from some folks that the change between say version five and version six was really large. Yes, it was. I didn't bring the numbers with me, but when we ran the first equalized people, the first ADM count that turns into equalized pupils, there were 62,000 ADM reported. I'm expecting about 86 to 87,000. I was expecting about 86 to 87,000 for this current year we're in. I don't know what the number's going to be, but I expect something around there. And you said your first one came in. 62,000. Okay, it's been growing. The last one that I did yesterday was at 83,000. So we're close. And I do remember what started us on the whole part. I've sent out eight different versions this so far. There will be more, but I've sent out eight different versions this so far. I don't know what the right number's supposed to be for districts. Because when you saw that they were certified up here, or ready for, well, we didn't show right for certification, when you saw that they were certified up here, I get the data. If they see an error in their data, and what happens to happen is they de-certify, I don't see their data anymore. When the data are pulled, their data are out. So what happens is their numbers can fluctuate, but the business man just have an idea of roughly what they are. And if their district has been identified as receiving whole harmless, which I show them on whatever I send out, they know that their number will not be lower than that. So they know what their lowest number can be. And so they have a better idea of what their actual number will be based on what they've seen before. So the business man has a reasonable idea of what they should be seeing at this point. And again, their numbers can't get any lower than some of the numbers they've seen in a lot of cases. They were identified as whole harmless counts. That's what the whole harmless connection was. So then in two weeks, everybody will know with that what the purple people count is that they will be using. That's what I'm saying. Yes. And the purple people count for those who don't know, because again, we haven't really talked about any of this. The purple people count is...  Yeah, I know you did. I heard him. But the purple people amount really drives the tax rate, is what it does for the homesteads. Is what school boards are paying attention to. That's right. That's what they're paying attention to. And this gives them enough time. I'm not sure what the 20 is in terms of warning. I think most... I think most warnings are done. Yeah, most are done at this point. Sort of have to go with the last best numbers. So what version were they going with? Well, that's what they could... I mean, again, they probably went in and said, well, I know that we were changing things here because we were higher at this point. And I know that we're... And so our dad was out, said probably picking the best number that they think out of the eight that they've seen. Yeah, it's not a good system this year. It is what it is. And the problem is going to be falling more in the smaller districts in the country. Yeah, except again, they do know what their minimum number will be, if worst-case scenario. So if their number comes in higher, that is actually good for them. And then those receiving small schools grants, that was another thing that was an issue. That had to do with the state board set up criteria for the small schools grants. They, on the excellence, what was it, academic excellence and operational efficiencies. That was one method of looking at who was eligible or distance and travel conditions. What the board did with the operational efficiencies and the academic equivalences, they came up with criteria that they wanted to use over a period of three years. They lumped them into four broad categories. And then we took an average of that out of the points of those categories. When I sat down and looked at what they had done and talked to our data people, they said, we don't have three years with the data, a lot of things. We will eventually, but some of these are new. This is the first year. Some of these were based on something. It was a trial. We said, we're not going to use these data for anything. We went back to the state board a week ago yesterday and said, here's what we did in the summer. We used one year's worth of data to get this. We've updated it with the minor changes that came in. These are the schools that meet your operational efficiencies and academic excellence ideas or criteria. And these are the ones that don't. And the ones that don't can look at geographic considerations later on. So the end result of all that is that of the, I think there were 35, 37 schools that were eligible for a small schools grant. Of those 37, I think all but three, oh, actually all but four made the operational efficiencies, criteria and academic excellence. They got eight out of 16, I think it was. Four of them were low. One of those four was Canaan, which is unquestionably geographically isolated. And so they're in with that. I'm not sure what's happened with the other three. Again, we just let them down.  We don't know what the numbers are because I don't know they're enrolling yet because we don't have finalized data here. But they do. And I sent out a file that says plug in your enrollment. It's K12 enrollment, plug that in or K whatever you are enrollment. And that will calculate what your grant should be within the close range of that. What's the range of the grant sums there? Some of them are fairly small, maybe a couple thousand dollars. But some of them are fairly substantial like $120,000, $130,000. I'm not sure what the maximum is, but it's in that range. It might be even higher than that. I think in fact, I think it might be 150,000 for this current year we're in. That's a significant amount of money. And who were the three that made the call? I think you're going to ask me. That's right. I think I believe I remember. Peechum was one. Bakersfield was another one. And then I believe the third one was Holland. But I believe Holland voted to close their school, I think. I've heard that anecdote, I haven't seen anything official. And then again, as I said, Cainan didn't, but I know Cainan definitely gets it due to geographic situation. So then Peechum and Bakersfield are at risk of losing their home to a grant. They don't meet the criteria. That's right. It's a question of do they meet the geographic criteria. And I'm not certain they do. And Peechum was not part of an emergency. It was not part of a crisis. And Bakersfield? Bakersfield was. Bakersfield merged with Berkshire. Except it was too small. It was just too small school districts with not a population to get the incentives. So they're not, when you got the incentives because of your size and the merger that happened, then any small school grants you had among those districts became a merger support grant. And it goes on in perpetuity. Sometimes it makes me shake a little bit. But the merger support grants go on in perpetuity. Bakersfield and Berkshire, and Bakersfield's one getting the grant, was too small for that. They did not get it. Windsor and West Windsor merged. They also were too small, but West Windsor qualified to get their grant. Okay. So then in two weeks, is this gonna be done? I'm hoping. Everybody's totally happy. Well, I wouldn't do it that far. They're rarely happy with what I put out. Questions? Is that a good one? You're confident that these stated discrepancies won't exist next year? I'm reasonably confident. I'm not confident. I think what's happening is that everybody's realized what's going on. I think there's gonna be work in the background on our side where they're working, making the systems in the field start talking to our system a little bit more directly or better in a more logical fashion. I think people have run through all the errors they can possibly come up with at this point. I think they're gonna get a lot of lessons learned. I think what we will do is we'll have a, once it's all said and done, we'll say, okay, here's, what was it on our side that was not working? What can we do better? And we'll be looking at that. And I'll be talking to businessmen and saying, what did you see that wasn't working? So there'll be a lot of back and forth trying to figure out what's going on. I don't think it will be anywhere near, there'll probably be issues because there are always issues in any data class you can understand, especially when it comes to students because they will forget to put in grades sometimes. But I think it will be significantly better than it has been this year. So you'll still be able to catch those mistakes? Yeah, yeah, yeah.  It's always easier. I'm not a real formal person, okay, so we'll do that now. Which is a real problem for me. Yeah, I know. I just lost my chair. Why? You won't be doing nothing around it. No, basically in the background on the data side, on the student data side, our folks are doing comparisons. They're looking to make sure that on one school district's counting student, or if they are, then it's split between the two. They're looking for unduplicated students, they're looking for students who it's just something that's not making sense. But it's hard to do that until we have all the data yet. But we're getting to the point when we're starting that process. There's early columns that we have to look at. There are four or five different things that people have to look at. So our people in the background, once they get the data, do look. And that's where we'll see, oh, wait a minute, your number, or I'll see it. You're missing a whole grade. That hasn't happened for years, but I do remember once there were three or four grades missing in front of the school and it's going, what? So, they're just human oversight. But the data are checked. They are reviewed by us. We do send it back out to them so they could see it. And that's a significant check right there. We're hearing the SLDS will be ready this spring. What are the chances that that's accurate? I don't know because I do not work directly with the SLDS. I would turn that over to those two. I am an LDS user in that I hear it from the business managers a lot. But I'm just a user that gets pulled out in hand too. So that's more a question for them. So, can I just clarify? Yes. The SLDS is working. It's functional. It operates as it's supposed to. It's the data. It's the coming in part. So, when, a way to phrase this question, I'm sure, when will the data be implemented so that the system is working and useful that we will be able to get the data from it? Well, the spring sense is, I don't know if there are the data collections being used for or not because again, it's not what I'm doing. But I do know that the spring data collection is the next really major thing and that will be at the end of the school year. So we're talking, talking probably July things when it gets rolled out, maybe it's August. It's one of, it's right, but it's basically then. And again, as Heather was saying, the spring census is significantly more difficult than the two that roll into equalized pupils because it's pulling from about eight different databases. But people are working their way through that and again, I think, as I was just saying, that I think there are a lot of lessons that are being learned that people understand, okay, this is what we need to do and they're working for it. And again, we'll be talking internally too. And you have project management with China on this. We would appreciate an update. Sure. We'll give you some time in a month. Yeah. Representative Austin, I need to move on. Yeah, be real quickly. I think this is data in form to make decisions. Just real quickly, the AOA, right, the legislature, school boards? School boards, yep, yep. The feds. The feds, yep. Yeah. Pretty much everybody. But it's not instruction, it's not data on assessment. No, that comes in through a different, that's one of what we call third party well, it's not third party, but it's a separate data collection that needs to be matched to this though. Okay, yep, thank you. There's a lot of managing that goes on in the background. Okay, yep. Thank you very much. You're very welcome. We just really send, we're sending good vibes to the department. Thank you. I'll pass those on. Where, please, does that help? Beer? Always. Not a dirty and marn's good. Sorry. Thank you very much. Always appreciate hearing something. Okay, so now we're going to talk to you today. Yeah, and we are back. Can you talk to me? No, I'm good. Before moving to H3 testimony, I did promise that I had a couple of handouts. Representative Austin, this is a summary of the training that we've provided for the SLDS. And then this is a summary of some of the documents we have on the report card. And I'm embarrassed to say that something happened in our color toner, which I didn't realize because the top half was fantastic. So I should throw them all until over gets the nice version. I think they're still legible. I can also send electronic copies. And as I said, I'm happy to come back and talk if the committee would need or would make an update or, because I know that there are a lot of new folks on the report card and SLDS. Yeah, I think that's true. I think that's the case of education. Yeah, okay. How do you do that? So shifting gears quite a bit, actually. Good morning again. And thank you for the opportunity to test the device today on another very important issue. For our state testimony on H3. I just have a pretty simple prepared statement that I'm just going to read. And then of course I'm open for questions as well. The agency certainly appreciates and supports the coalitions and this committee's focus on ensuring equitable learning opportunities and educational experiences for all Vermont students. Indeed, as you heard from Secretary French two days ago, when we jointly testified before you, the primary role of the AOE is to ensure quality and equity across our educational systems statewide. So we're supportive of this bill and we'd like to offer a few additional points for the committee's consideration so as to improve the overall product. Before highlighting these points for your consideration, however, I would like to share with the committee just a few examples of the work that the AOE has undertaken in the context of our shared conversations on initial and current versions of H3. I'm finding myself in a bit of a wing flapping excited to share with you what we've been doing. Fran have signed this morning. We've got some really hard-working staff as I know you know it's feeling pretty protective of them wanting to make sure that we're all aware of what they're doing. So what we've done in the past several months is first as an agency, we defined educational equity. We hadn't really been operating within the organization under the same sort of shared understanding of what equity was when we were talking about it. We also, and that definition as you can see is meaning that every student has access to the resources, opportunities and educational rigor that they need at the right moment in their education.  And we adapted this from CCSSO. I've done very well with acronyms today. Yes, so I was just going to say that. CCSSO is the Council for Chief State School Officers. So it is the national organization for the secretaries and deputies that run state agencies or deputy commissioners and commissioners across the country. And they do a lot of work trying to ensure consistency across state agencies. And so they have recently in the past year really been taking a strong lead in a national conversation on what equity looks like and why it's important, as you might imagine. When you look at different states across the nation, their equity looks different in terms of the student population and how it's framed or what's done about it looks quite different as well from a state perspective. We've also developed an equity lens tool for internal agency staff. And this tool allows us to look at any statute, any legislative document, any policy program or practice that's currently in place or that's proposed so we can actually take a deep dive into what are the equity implications of this. Here's an example of why this has been important with some existing legislation. Many of you are familiar with Act 77 and our state funded dual enrollment program. So, or I'm actually, for this example, I'm going to use Early College, which is our state funded Early College program. So, Early College statute for reasonable reasons requires us, requires students to actually disenroll from their high school so that they can actually be a full time college student. Well, we realized early on that is a real challenge for students who qualify for free reduced lunch because now they're faced with the choice of do I forego having a hot lunch? And for some students that really is an issue or even breakfast in an after school or do I take this opportunity on that the state is paying for me? So, we're using the tool both to take a look at existing statute where through no fault of I think all of us in our best intentions we perhaps have set up some barriers from an equity perspective that we need to attend to. So, in that document, I'm very happy to share. I didn't bring copies today, but I'm very happy to provide that to the committee. You might be interested in looking at that. We've actually had a lot of regional attention from other state agencies in New England for that document as well. And at the national level, some of the other state agencies out west and in the west were very excited because they hadn't started doing this kind of work. So, we're pretty excited about that. As of August, this just this past August, we successfully completed what we call the C project, supporting educational equity. And this was also funded by CCSSO as I just explained what that group does and is. So, our staff of the agency collaborated with a number of K-12 teachers around the state asking them what classroom level and systemic improvements they felt were needed to fully leverage the equity changes in our state ESSA plan. And as you'll see on, we are doing a better job, as you'll see on those report card documents, of actually holding schools accountable for metrics from an equity perspective. So, one of the actual accountability measures is how are you doing at the school level and at the district, operational district or SU level in terms of equity gaps using the groups that are described through our ESSA state plan in terms of defining equity, which I'll talk about a little bit more in a moment. I think it's interesting to point out that many of the responses framed from this particular project echo what the H3 bill is trying to do. And we are really excited about that. So, many of the teachers focused on we really need more professional development opportunities. We don't have enough professional development to really seriously look at equity and really seriously make sure we're doing a good job. We have the intent and we're excited about this, but we need some supports. They also identified meeting additional supports for helping them create curricula, for helping them purchase instructional materials and kind of make those decisions about which materials are the best bet from an equity perspective and also designing their learning environments to be more inclusive. And then, this project also concluded with specific actions that the AOE plans to take to address these recommendations. And I'm happy again to share that full document with the committee as well. And then, and again, there's other work that we're doing, but I just wanted to provide some highlights just so that you're aware of the work that has been happening at the agency per se. We have existing ongoing work through our professional networks at the state education agency level that focus on engendering educational equity. And I think you can see this evident in many of our very recent documents and technical guidance to the field. So, it's clearly a frame of our career tech and strategic vision that was recently developed collaboratively across the state with a variety of different stakeholders, not just within education this past summer. You can see it in our framework for comprehensive and equity school supports, what we're actually providing to our schools to help them actually meet these accountability metrics when they're struggling. And also, you can see this in the mission and vision of the League of Innovative Schools, which some of you may or may not be familiar with, which is more of a New England regional group that's run through the New England Secondary School Consortium. It happens to be that the bulk of, these are secondary schools, the bulk of League of Innovative Schools are actually in Vermont. So, we really resonated with this. And this stems from a lot of the Act 77 work. So, really trying to enhance and best offer flexible pathways opportunities for students. And so, Nessie actually has identified particular high schools across New England that actually are, they deem as best practice schools and we, the agency, works with them to continue to spread the good word about the work that they're doing. So again, I wanted to just update the committee on some of that work. Our staff are very committed and excited about this work. We're proud of the work and it's, as I said, part of both regional and national conversations that we continue to participate in and lead. So, I do wanna have, I do have some, just a few additional notes regarding the current version of the bill that I just wanted to bring forth for the committee's consideration. The first was spoken about a couple of days ago and I just wanted to follow up on that. The disaggregation of information by student groups. So, I just, we wanna be sure that the committee is aware of the implications of disaggregation by student groups as identified in the bill. As you know, our state is somewhat unique in terms of a large number of small schools, as we were talking about earlier today, that comprise our education system. And this has significant effects on what information can be reported at a student level, particularly when we're talking about highly sensitive topics, such as hazing, harassment and bullying, or student-academic performance. And these, of course, are what's identified in the bill for a good reason. So, because our small school populations, especially when they're disaggregated into even smaller groups, which is currently the case in Vermont for race or ethnicity, student race, ethnicity, or student ELL status, for example, they make it easier for community members to identify who specific students are and state regulations and federal regulations often don't allow public sharing of that information. And it's for a good reason. We don't want the general public to have sensitive information about particular students. That's really what this issue is about. So just in terms of the language, the way the language is written in the bill. Yep, there's nothing wrong with the language. Just as long as we understand that. Do you think that the language accounts for the fact that it's sensitive data and we're not gonna be able to get it when we have a really small sample? Yep, it does. I just want to be crystal clear what that means though, which is you may have a report that is filled with a bunch of asterisks. That means the data are suppressed. So that's all this point is about. I just want to be clear. So people could potentially be frustrated when they get a report back that doesn't have the specific group information they're looking for. But we should be able to get it at a state level. Yes, absolutely. And for some... Will be filled in. Yes, it depends, particularly under Act 46 if we're talking about operating districts and SUs, for instance, we will be seeing more information at a higher level. It's when you start breaking down by school, by specific group where, again, the information is just not legally available and I think most of us, I see a lot of head nodding, we understand why and agree with that. So yes, there's nothing wrong with the language. I just want to... I feel it's my due diligence to remind the committee what this actually will look like when you're absolutely looking at a particular report. My second point is attention to inclusion of students and families in distress in the bill language. As I noted, the AOE is certainly supportive of the focus on equity for students from a variety of ethnic and social groups. It's important to highlight, however, that the bill's current definition of social groups does not include students or individuals and families experiencing economic distress. We realize that the overarching focus of this work will be on racial and ethnic justice efforts and do not wish to dilute that focus. However, again, we would be remiss to not point out that economic distress and disadvantage is a clear factor in many aspects of inequity within our statewide education system. In fact, it's one of the most robust time and time again indicators of inequity across a variety of different outcomes. So I have, for instance, I have shown you here just for your perusal, not going to go through each of these, some latest data on what are outcomes in terms of the post-secondary, transition to post-secondary space look like, and we certainly have other data if the committee were interested with younger students that we could talk. Just an example showing that just as students with students with disability or ELL students who qualify for ELL services, we see some of the same patterns of inequity for our economically disadvantaged students. And so we just feel it important to bring that to the committee's attention as potentially an oversight. We would assume unintentionally, actually. I also wanted to note that our economic disadvantage factor would align with the agency's SS State Plan. One of the reasons that we actually identified a supergroup which is historically marginalized youth, and I forgot to mention this in point one, is because of that small sample size piece. So in order to actually hold even our small schools to account in terms of what they're, where they're showing in terms of performance which is the part of the purpose of ESSA, we had, in our state plan, we developed a supergroup of historically marginalized students. So it actually is a global group of students who qualify for any of those categories together because that allows us, it's different than what H3 is looking for, which is okay, but it actually allows us to then be able to say, okay, if we use as the frame that you are either an historically marginalized student for a variety of reasons or you're not, we can actually look at smaller schools then and be able to see over a period of time. So again, I would come back and be able to talk more about that, but that including some kind of mention of economic distress, students in academic distress would align a little more closely with our historically marginalized group, which would then also I think be, it would facilitate the data that we can get to. I know I'd revan data somehow, right, from the last presentation. Just a couple more points. Statutes, State Board of Education rules and curriculum development, you have already taken significant testimony from a variety of education experts on this bill, including representatives from the School Board's Association, Superintendent's Association, the Principal's Association and the Chair of the State Board of Education just yesterday. As others have noted, the authority and responsibility for curriculum development lies at the local level currently in Vermont. The SBE adopts state education standards and AOE's work in this area, as you heard about yesterday, has typically framed such adoption requests of late on highly vetted nationally benchmark frameworks. I'm not sure I would say that's because of staffing issues at the agency. I think it's because we're coming to realize that, why not use some great frameworks, at least as a starting point, and not start over from square one in our own state, so not having to reinvent the wheel, so to speak. So in addition, we would also echo the recommendations that the work group review what has already been done in terms of other states, so that we're not necessarily reinventing the wheel here. In addition, we would also echo previous testimony that the real lever for the cultural shift we're all trying to achieve is not necessarily at the curriculum or standards level per se, but it's really an instructional practice. We hope that this issue is considered in final deliberations on the bill. And then finally, I do wanna speak just a bit to agency capacity for the required work. We are concerned about the potential workload on the agency as a result of passing H3, although as I said, and really clearly mean, we support the intention and goals of the bill, given our current federal and state demands. We simply, at this time, don't have sufficient staffing available to help the advisory group organize and collect the information required in order for this work to be successful. What would you need? We would be happy to come back with a specific proposal. We just wanted that to be sort of a thought today. We're working with it a month up today. I'm not sure I'm gonna have an actual figure for you today. It's, I have to do a little bit more, I was gonna say reconnaissance, but certainly a little bit more figuring what that would look like. I wonder if, do I, would you like to? I have some questions, but I can wait. We got a little bit tangled yesterday with the State Board of Education in terms of the standards. The bill calls for, your reference is curriculum standards. We realize that does not exist, but we do have state standards and those come from the national level. So the bill talks about adding standards. Would you, what would you say in terms of that language? Well, I think- Is that gonna make the difference? What's gonna make the difference for our students in school? I think, I mean, I think how we have worked with the board under the education part of the standards that are currently in place is, we have worked with them so that the board will adopt standards in a particular arena. For instance, they have adopted ISD standards, which are the, their education technology. I don't know what ISD, I got caught. It's one acronym, but they're the education technology standards for students. So they are what our education technology directors look to towards, here are at a high level what I need to be ensuring that students are learning at a high level. That's what standards are, very high level. We have also done that with C3 standards. As I know, I think you heard about yesterday. We've done that with art standards. We've done that with financial, right now there's a consideration to adopt financial literacy standards. So I don't think the issue is really, in our view, I don't think the issue is whether it's a national standard or not. It's about the state board of education has the authority to adopt standards. So if we left the language, the work group shall review state standards adopted by the board, and then recommend, we could call it changes or additions to recognize would that language be acceptable to you? It would if you say changes to such standards. I mean, because I think the important point that my understanding is, I wasn't here, but from reading the testimony, the important point the chair of the SBE was trying to say yesterday is that they don't have control over the curriculum that emanates from those standards. They have control over just the standards, which are at a higher level. And I think there's just some confusion about what control do they have over those standards if they're national standards? They've adopted. They've adopted national, if they are national standards, they've adopted them and said, these are, these are not state standards. In this case, they happen to be these national standards. And you're saying that they have made changes to those standards? They have adopted new standards. So as part, they adopted the Common Core state standards a few years back. They've adopted these education technology standards. They've adopted C3 standards, which is social or global studies. I used to be calling, I'm relying my age, used to be social studies. So what are those studies called now? C3, acronym I have to list them on. I'm thinking that's the standard that this might fit in. I think that has the greatest overlap. Right. But I guess in a nutshell, what we're recommending is that the advisory group just looked to see whether there are some standards that already exist and whether they would be a fit. It's not requiring that those be the fit. They might not be a good fit. From our perspective, we started with those national standards because a lot of work has been done on them. A lot of really good work on these other sets of standards that I just laid out, which meant we didn't have to do the work if we agreed that the work was solid. Does that help clarify? I know that other members continue. Did you have a question? No, I just, I, you know, when I was, I've been thinking about this a lot because it just seems the outcome, we all want the same outcome. It's just the process, the implementation, I think is what is, you know, we need to be really intentional and thoughtful about everybody's time. The two years that the committee is gonna be putting in and making sure that the outcome of that can be implemented easily and doesn't have to be revised a lot because it doesn't fit into kind of what the standards are now. But I think it would be helpful to look at the standards that are already, we already have and see where and if, you know, what the committee would like as an outcome, you know, if there were ways it could be, you know, integrated into that. The concern I have is the curriculum at the local level. And I'm gonna say this because I was thinking about this a lot last night. You know, there's a whole issue of bias. You know, I don't think a lot of us are intentionally biased but I think we carry that with us just because we come from a certain group or economic group, social group, whatever. And so my concern when we say we're talking to teachers about developing curriculum for a group where we don't know what we don't know. You know what I mean? As kind of white teachers in a white state, we don't know what the experience is really of an African American or a gay or, well, maybe gay but African American, I think it's hard or all the groups that we're talking about. So my concern is, you know, the teachers that may have a bias unintentional. You know, it's just kind of the way we've grown up and our thinking and our lens are creating curriculum, you know, that may be not accurate and reliable. If to no one's fault, you know, but that's my concern. So I think certainly we would share that concern and there's clearly research and evidence that indicates that. I think there's an entire field of implicit bias that underlies exactly what you're saying representative Austin. I wanna clarify though, the agency's perspective is we have not been providing that training. The project I talked about actually asked the field what would you need and many of them, as I said, are recognizing just that. Like I'm not, you know, as a person, I'm not of an identified social group. I'm not talking personally, I'm talking in the frame of like the general on this project. I, you know, those teachers are identifying like we need someone who has this expertise to help us. The other thing I would point out is that both the VPA and the VSBA and VSA combined have really also been trying to support. My understanding is, and I've been at meetings where it's been discussed. They're trying to really support the current level that has kind of responsibility for this role, which is the district, the operational district and SEO, I'm just always gonna say that. That's where that responsibility really lies. And so that's, they're also on board with really trying to make sure that it isn't just, that, you know, they're really attuned to the issues that you're exactly talking about. Does that mean that something in addition isn't required or necessary? Of course not. But I think it's part of a more robust conversation that I would hope is part of what the advisory committee would actually engage in. Thank you. And also just looking at curriculum development at the SEO level, do they have a tool to see how, do we have a tool to evaluate our curriculum to see if we have implicit bias or is everybody included? I suspect some probably do, but I suspect some absolutely not. And again, we're back to the interest or lack thereof in having everything kind of the same. So we have a group of people who are really engaged in wanting to have an impact on our schools and identified area where bias exists, where people are missing in history. They are there, they're charged and they're ready to go. I am trying to sort out, is this language going to, or is there other changes to this language that's gonna help this group direct them to do the thing that's gonna make the difference on the ground? What's gonna change this culture? Because this group of people, many of them from marginalized, it's ready to go. And they're just hungry to go. And I just wanna make sure I'm not sending them into something that's ridiculous. I wanna send them into something where they're gonna send them. And I'm looking at this language and I'm trying to get that language to work to make sure that that's what we're doing. So we know that we wanna take out the word curriculum because that doesn't really exist. In the framework, we heard yesterday in the framework that's where I was and I was teaching, we were using the framework and there was loads of places you could go in there. But then I would be replaced by the education quality standard. Right. So I guess I'm asking you to look at page seven. Do these have the work group? Number one, if you could help us. Thank you. I'm pretty delighted. And look at that language and see if that language is going to, we've got the principal saying it's okay, we've got the supervisor saying it's okay. We have the NDA saying it's okay, we have the board saying it's not okay and we're the committee that needs to sort that language out. Sure. So I think our sense is that given the current short of opening up Title 16 at a broader level and really rethinking, which we're probably not gonna do at this moment, maybe we will in the coming years, I think it's written the way, the only way it can be written. I mean, I don't know that I don't, it seems to fit what the charge of the legislature and the state board are currently required to do. So Title 16, they may look at it. That's the language and the statutes. But in this first paragraph, number one, under the work group, meetings of the work group. Can you show her that? Right here. Yep, she's got it. The work group shall review statewide standards adopted by the state board of education and honor before June 30th, 2021, recommend to the state board updates and additional standards to recognize fully the history, contributions and perspective of ethnic groups and social groups. And these recommended additional standards are designed to, which is what they're designed to do. So a couple of things. So the working group, which I call the advisory committee, I'm sorry, shall make recommendations. And I wondered if we wanted to make recommendations. I think you were working on that. That state board rule. The state board make recommendations to a legislature or make recommendations to the state board of education or both. I mean, it's something to kind of think about. So again, I don't see a problem with that language. I think the problem that we're trying to grapple with is this would, again, these are recommendations. So should the board adopt those recommendations, these standards would then be in the same place as the other standards that are adopted by the board. So that's what I'm trying to clarify. They do not dictate, here's what you will do in the classroom, teacher or curriculum coordinators. So that's the rub. I don't see anything wrong with this language. And in fact, it actually aligns with the way we've been actually adopting other standards. I cannot solve the other issue of how we actually require curricular change of the local level in the current context we're in. That's coming up with that self-evaluation tool for curriculum coordinators, which may be beyond the scope of what we're doing here. Representative Elder. So I guess my understanding of kind of what this bill would accomplish is to set a broad high level emphasis that standards that take in mind this type of admin and racial equity are really important. Which would be new. Which would be new. And so what I understand is that a lot of best practices over time are developed at the local level and that in fact, classroom educators are often at the forefront of developing that and then to some degree through our state and local system to disseminating those best practices to other schools. It's a process that takes time. Would you agree that this simply by having a standard does not dictate curriculum, does not reach all the way down to the lower level. To me, it feels like it would empower those who are, some people are gonna be ahead of others in terms of their cultural competency and their sort of relationship with their own implicit bias. So those that are more on the vanguard of that, I feel like this would empower them to start the work. Do you agree with that? Yes, it would actually, for instance, an example, if there were resistance to that. So at the local level. So what standards mean are you as the local education agency are responsible for ensuring that these standards are met. You may select how you ensure that students meet those standards, but you have to ensure that students are actually meeting these standards. They're meeting the common core standards. You can choose, that's as an example. So you can choose which particular curriculum you wanna offer your students to do that. You have to ensure that they're meeting the C3 standards because common core did not include global studies. Oh, next generation science standards, same thing. So it would, again, is what I'm saying is it would actually highlight this information in that same thing. That would say like you have to ensure that your students are achieving these standards. I have one follow-up, can I? Please. I just- In equity and social groups. I mean, how, broadly different. Yeah, thank you. Your last point about agency capacity. So are you saying there that in order for this, because clearly we don't wanna pass a bill that's gonna run up against just- Sure. You know, a lack of capacity to meet additional appropriation. What's the upshot of that point? I'm not, I don't have, I'm not prepared to say exactly what we would need. I just wanna raise the question. It's possible, we don't have the current staffing. Other states have actually accounted for FTE in their bills. We also could, if it meets contractual requirements, we could actually, we would need funds to actually engage in a contract to actually get this information for the working group. So that's kind of why I'm not in a position yet where I can actually have a robust recommendation about that, it also, I mean, I think we have time just given the final nature of the bill. It still goes up to appropriations. And that could be the place where that sort of- And it's gonna have to go through the other body as well. And so we could, I think that's more, you know, in transparency, like we haven't had enough time to kind of think that through. We're just alerting that this is a concern for us. I have a couple of questions. Thank you so much, Dr. Pichet, for taking all this time this morning. I know we've kept you in the hot seat for a while, so I hope you're feeling all right. Yeah, sure. So- My cold is gone. Yes. Right in the way of your mask. This is very helpful to get your feedback. Last year, as you recall, S-257 passed as amended by the House and set up this group process to start on September 1st of 2018. So I think I can understand why so many people are ready to go. They felt, or at least thought, that the work might begin and they're ready to start it. And they're saying, why can't we just go? So that's a challenge. Would the agency have had the same resource concerns when that bill passed? Yes. Okay. In terms of the agency's capacity, there was discussion last year about the role of a facilitator. Might that be something that the agency would be interested to discuss? Is this bill moves through the process this year? Sure. I think, you know, again, in full transparency, I think the concern from our perspective is that as sort of the experts in collecting the statutes, helping get out to the field to get, if we want to move to a local level, that's the real issue. And so, you know, we can't, we want to be involved and we can't not be involved. It's really just trying to figure out how that's a feasible and reasonable lift from our perspective. So for instance, what we don't want to get into is a bill that passes and we have, for the agency, another mandated huge lift that we don't have the capacity to even try to, for instance, get some additional assistance to help with. We are... Which, you know, it has happened in the past and I think it's been okay. We could absorb it. Maybe not in the past five years, but in years past when we were a fuller agency. We are aware that with 173 coming in, you're understaffed for that. And that's major. And we're also aware of, you know, initiative fatigue. Well, and you did, the legislature gave us two positions for 173, which we are hiring. So we will be okay. But... I don't have a conversation about classifying too. And you're having trouble because those people are probably have a contract until June. You're having trouble because you're not paying enough. I just like the classification that they're at, is it just the wrong one? Well, I think that it's possible, but that's also a much broader issue in terms of, like the full state government issue. Not just an agency issue. So for instance, as you know, particularly in any union environment, we have restrictions on what we can offer. It's not even so much. It is about pay. But the first place is like, what is the beginning starting point for a new role? And so that's the kind of thing we actually run into. Do you have anything to say? I spoke too soon. I'm sorry, I have so many questions and I'm gonna try to keep them really brief to be conscious of your time and everyone else's. But on the poverty indicator, you had indicated that poverty status was an important consideration that perhaps could be better represented in the bill because we know the negative impact we might have on our learners. Sorry. Do you feel as though the reporting requirement, the data piece, which is inclusive of a poverty indicator, helps address some of that because that would provide us with information around the poverty question that you raised without actually digging into the definitions around social group and ethnic group, which have been defined to include people who have been historically marginalized without a place in our education system or at least with a much diminished presence. Do you feel as though the data piece is sufficient for this group to focus on those poverty indicators? I think as a former member of that social group myself, I feel both professionally and personally pretty strongly about this. So, but I also wanna clarify that this is not an attempt to pit different social groups against one another or to negate the ethnic and the ethnic focus, the ethnic group focus of the bill, as I think I was pretty clear in my statement. I think if the bill had not included other social groups, I think to me and to the agency, it seems to be a logical omission that you would not actually identify as a social group linked with an equity students who are experiencing economic distress. In other words, that in and of itself is an identity. It is an identity to actually be in a position of economic distress just as it is an identity, whether you have special needs just as it is an ethnic identity. It's really from a multi, you know, a multiple identity perspective, and there's some literature on that as well. So I think our point of consideration is just considering whether that should be part of the social definition, which would then indicate that there's some coverage of that on the working group as well. We're not suggesting that a separate person. I mean, this is also a sense of information. So, you know, how would you go about requesting folks that, I mean, I just identified myself in that form of capacity, but not everyone feels comfortable doing that. It took me a long time, by the way, but I'm not at a place in my... And can I ask one follow-up question? You can hear where I'm at. And then I will stop. I did not ask this at the State Board, Chair Yesvee, and I wish I had. Do you support the bill in its current form? Yes, and we would support it without any of the recommendations. These are things that we deem important for the bill, for the community to consider. Can I have you look at page eight? Yeah. The work group may review all existing state snatches regarding the school policies. Is that... I have something about putting more rules in that step. Let me show you some language. I had a discussion with some folks about how we might re-craft that. So, if you move to this one, what I'm looking at now says State Board Rules and School District Policies. So, again, that's going to be a much heavier lift. If we want some kind of categorizing process of school district policies, we've never undertaken that as a state. So, that would be pretty massive. State Board Rules is also different than the standards. So, State Board Rules is also massive. I mean, it's the full panoply of what the State Board... It's basically how the State Board has interpreted anything to do with legislation on education. Just want to clarify that before. Well, I thought that one of the ideas was that it would be standards. So, right, so there's a difference between standard. Statutes is the highest level. Rules and standards are... Rules directly come from statute. Standards are something that the Board has a unique ability to adopt. They're sort of separate from rules and statute. So, there isn't a rule... There's a rule that says you have the authority to adopt standards, I'm sure, somewhere. But it doesn't say... Those don't stem from particular legislation usually. So, under the duties of the Board Group under one, it's reviewing the standards. Hello. You showed me your amazing background. Yeah. Fantastic. I have it. Amanda, you know our little school bus, right? I know. I've never seen a school bus like this. Thank you for reminding me why I do this all the time. I don't get to see the little people as much as I would like to. I hope you have the batteries from the school bus. So, number one is on page seven is to review the state standards. Number two is to review statutes. Yes, okay. Regarding school policies. Oh. So, what is the question? You know, identity to work curriculum under A. Ensuring that the school curriculum promotes critical thinking. I'm just wondering, do we have a problem here? Well... We used that word that we're not supposed to touch. Yeah. It also might make sense. That is an issue because for the conversation that we just had, but it also might make sense to... It depends on how broad you want that state statutes. Like, do you want that? If you stick at statutes, do you want those that just pertain to standards development or curriculum development? Otherwise, again, it's the entire body. Statutes is the entire body of what this general assembly has put forth. It's all of those books in the equity. Yes. And then it would be identifying what's still on the books, what's not, what's been adopted. And I'm not saying, I don't have a strong opinion on that other than what I've already said about our ability to help with that, but I just want to, I'm trying to help clarify for the committee what this language, to my understanding, actually, it's almost... Do others have a question on this? What's in the most? Yeah. You know, being a former teacher and student member, my thinking is, when I was writing standards, I mean, I think the first step is an actual step that the committee look at the state standards, because I think that will help them see how they're thinking a little bit about how they want to get to the outcome. So then I think the next step is for them as a group to come to some consensus amongst themselves about the skills and knowledge and values. They would like to see students leaving Vermont schools with. And then the third part would be the implementation. And the implementation to me is the planning to me is pretty, I mean, as a teacher, was really enjoyable. I enjoyed it. It's the implementation to me where I am hoping that some real thinking goes into this in terms of trying to get that outcome that this group, and I think all of us are on. So do you see it that way in that kind of... I do, I do. And you reminded me of another piece that I learned a long while ago, which has helped, which is, as you move from statute rule, you could think in this particular case, even though it doesn't naturally flow, but a standard, you're moving from almost like a cudgel approach, like everyone shall do this to, okay, you're getting much more down to the meat of what's happening as you go further down. And so I think the committee and the group, the coalition just needs to kind of wrestle with that or figure out where is the lever. And if it's all levers, that's okay, but that's a much more massive task. And it might then be something you want to consider doing in over several years, for instance. I wish I had the silver bullet answers that you're looking for, Chair Webb. If it had a silver bullet, it would have already been done. That's true. It never comes to us that here's the silver bullet and we don't have to ask it well done yet. I think the good thing is we're all trying to get on the same path together, which is tremendous motivation to make a difference here. There's tremendous amount of motivation from this committee, from the advocacy group, and from all stakeholders, there is a... Including the State Board, as let's testify. Including the... I would always say, especially the State Board. I mean, actually, the Chair of the Board is actually teaching this stuff. She's actually teaching the diversity issues. And she's doing that today. So they review all existing state statutes? Would you change that to Title 16? Or would you focus it even more? If I were... I can't speak on behalf of the coalition. I promise you they will speak on behalf of themselves. Sure. So it's hard for me to answer that question because the intent of the bill could have... There could be different intents for the bill. So if the intent of the bill is to have, for instance, as legal and close a connection to change instruction, then no, that's far too broad. Because most of the work would be spent on looking at the entire set of green books. This has no restriction, time-wise, even. In terms of starting in year, whatever, that you really wanna look at. And again, however, you might wanna do that if the intent is to really look at, who knows, bias has started at the statute level forever. Again, those are both worthy goals. I can't answer what the ultimate goal is for the committee. They have goals that they've listed here, but I'm gonna let them hopefully speak. And by goal, I'm sorry, I mean which level, which level to actually move in to actually meet the goals as I'm talking about. Can you go to page two? Sure. Line 16, it says in some instances, teachers employ curriculum materials and lesson plans that promote racial stereotypes. And then go back to page eight. How do we, and I can see where there may be an issue on line four, in sharing that the school curriculum promotes all the way through to line 16.  You could adopt a particular standard that says you must ensure, this is just as one example, you must ensure that students are provided, I'm looking at page two, where that is, provided with materials that do not promote historical racial stereotypes. That could be part of a standard. But again, that isn't saying how the classroom or the school would do that. So that's the point I keep trying to make. You can make standards that say what you want. I think you would get into some political challenges in terms of the limitation if you tried to make the standard say your curriculum has to be this, because there really is a distinction between what a curriculum is and what a standard is. That's where my confusion is. A standard is a higher, a curriculum is more specific. A curriculum is here's the set of lesson plans that are gonna meet this standard. So as an example, I'm using science. Students need to know, I'm just gonna pull something out, like details of the Copernican Revolution. I think I remember hazily what that is. So a curriculum would be unit one, this is introduction to Copernican Revolution and I'm trying to do something neutral, which is not because this is a very western topic I've picked. Assignment one, assignment two, assignment three. Like that's what the curriculum is. It's that level of detail. So that's understandably why, well, and then in the curriculum are lesson plans and those kinds of things. But that's I think why historically for good or not, that's been left at that local level because folks haven't really wanted to entertain how you might dictate that level of specificity to a person who's teaching. We're in a situation where if those are biased and what is actually being done at the classroom level or the school level is not working, we're trying to figure out like how do we actually make that happen? You know, Texas has a state curriculum. It says, this is actually what you will teach and this is how. We are not, that's not who we are right now. And what you know? Maybe, maybe not. And I'm neutral on that. Like, you just got everybody nervous when you said right now. Well, no, and I knew when I said that. From a purely bureaucratic perspective, how easy is it, right? From like an actual like, do I want to be a teacher anymore ever? No, because you know, you could feel like a robot then. Does it mean that these are not really thorny, very important issues that we need to wrestle with? Of course not. So I hope that nothing I'm saying is coming across as glid or as flip, that this is not something, it's just, it's complex and it has implications for the way we have set up our entire education system in terms of again, what is the lever we're trying to actually use to get what we want at this point in time? I wonder, you can't change culture in two years, right? And so that would be another way to think about it. You know, if you consider, when people eat ball of slavery, we still have a long way to go and it's been well over 150 years. We can make a hack of a lot of progress in two years. Certainly. I'm just gonna put one that I'm getting back to because I'm really working on language right now. In terms of this work group, they review all existing state statutes and we can work on that language. But to review what the goals are, the goals are to ensure that the curriculum promotes these things and ensures that engagement opportunities that provide families a welcoming means of raising any concerns and it will include a report. So I'm, what are your thoughts on that? I mean, again, given the conversation we've had, you might consider ensuring that the standards promote these things. Ensure that instead of the school curriculum, ensure that the standards. Or ensure that, I'm trying to think of some other things that have been passed for me. The standards promote. The standards promote, but I'm also trying to think about, or that, you know, you do have some authority to say that or the statutes. That operating districts and schools abide by these standards. I mean, you could say that. Ensuring that these schools promote critical thinking. You could say that they promote, but that's all in the standards over there. Right. They're all about critical thinking. Well, no, I didn't read the rest of the sentence. Oh, okay, sorry. So again, because we're looking for a specific language that's going into this bill. I wanted us to get this sorted out. And it's a goal, it's not an entry. It's true. Another way to maybe think about this is that the education system is very used to the state board adopting standards. So that would be something that they would be expecting. And as I also pointed out, and I think it has the money on, our educators are not resistant to this cultural change as a group. They're interested in doing this work. So it may make sense, just as a thought experiment, to actually start with standards and then come back once some progress has been made on that to come back to statute, depending, and again, it didn't mean to alarm people.  No, we understand that. But to be able to come back and then say, okay, so we have these standards, how's it been going? We would then also probably have some best practices of curricula at the local level within Vermont to actually be able to showcase and use. This has been really helpful. Is it possible, I know it feels like we're starting to mark up with an additional committee member? Yeah, and we've taken so much of Dr. Bichet's time, and it's helpful to have an expert witness. I just wondered if we could have a five minute break to recollect. I think that's a good idea. Okay, thank you. Thank you. And would you be able to stay in the room? I'm actually, I really needed to leave at 10.30, so. Well, you're on less time. No. No. No. So, okay. So. If you want to shoot me some messages on some specific language, I'm verifying with that. We've got some people coming in the 11.45. We have five minutes before and after the governor's address to, if some questions come up during our march up. But I think that's right. Thank you for that. We will take a break. We very much appreciate your input. It's extremely helpful. Great, thank you. I'm very happy to help. Yeah, 11.45 is canceled. Oh, 11.45 canceled. Okay, so. At least we don't have that time. Yeah. Okay, good. So, thank you very much. Okay, a break. Yeah. What time would you like us back here? Definitely. Yeah, yeah. Jake, wrong place. Why don't we take 10 minutes? So let's say 11.20. Is that fair for everybody? What's having chat? Thanks. All right, thanks. Thank you. Okay, Jim, why don't you join us? I was going to have Peter just do a kickoff of this discussion that we're about to have in terms of this bill. Just to kind of focus on the big picture, what we're up to, so. Yeah, so these are, this is going to include basically some of my personal views on where we go. And I think you were thrown for a little bit of a curve yesterday, but I think what we're dealing with is what we'd like to see happen, which is affect what's going on in the classrooms and really what can we do at the level that we sit up here in the community. I think what we've learned, and we should all be very clear at all times, is we can't dictate curriculum. The department or the state board of education doesn't dictate curriculum. So we're not going to be able to affect that. So what can this bill do? I think, I think we should kind of hit the nail on the head that the bill has sort of written the only way it can be given our current system of how we do things. I think there are some small word changes we can make. The word curriculum is a little bit of a third rail. But so this working group is going to be really tasked with, as she said, wrestling with which levers can be pulled and which levers to pull. And I think that this bill sort of gives them that ability to do that. And again, what they come out of are really strictly recommendations anyway.  So what's the power of the standard? We've learned it well. Still curriculum is done at the local level. But I think the other thing that I heard today really resonated was that standards at least have the power to counter local resistance to change. In other words, if a school is saying we need to have a more inclusive curriculum and here's where we're going to go, they can fall back on the standard and say, you know, and we're doing this because the state standards say we need to. And that seems to me that that is the direction that this is going. It's not going to solve implicit bias and racism in our communities. But it's going to take hopefully a step there. And you know, we were talking a little bit about the part that where they can also be effective, which is looking at state statutes. And they want to put some parameters on that, maybe just looking at educational state statutes and looking at the wording to see if they could be voted somewhat differently. But that would come back to us to then make changes with recommendations. And then finally, there's always the question of what can the AOE do? What's their capacity? Can the staff, to me, the bill doesn't yet define or the working group doesn't get defined. What does they want from the AOE? So we don't even know what's being asked of them. And maybe that's something that gets done without a leader date when they say, you know, we need all this assistance from the AOE and then the AOE comes in with a request. I'm not sure we're at that point yet. So I feel far more comfortable with what we have today compared with yesterday afternoon. My highly agree with it. And we're also just reminding folks that this is what's happening this year. There will be a report back. They may be asking for some other things. They may be asking for resources. They may be asking for other changes. But this is at least getting the process started. So with that, let's, anybody, any other comments? Why don't we just, any other comments right now on the big picture of what we're trying to do. And we're gonna let this be a little bit more discussion-like that this was going along here. So shall we, shall we start looking at the words? Okay, so page one. Do you know who wrote this on the screen right now? Yes, that would be great. Thank you. The very one I was over doing that. Yes, as introduced version of the bill. All right. Publicly or just on the screen right now? Like do you want it online? Oh, I only want to look at it. All right. Yeah, all right. Yeah, I think it's already online. But we want to look at it. So as you were saying, we want to put some heart for you. Yeah, I think that's a good idea. You know how to get on top of that? I should. Okay. Two more, six, eight, ten. Oh, two more, six, eight, ten. We haven't, we haven't amended it yet. We're gonna try to get one in that one. Six, six, six, one bill. Yeah. That's what you're gonna say now. One, five. Okay, so the first is the statement of purpose of the bill. Now just remind us what we can change and what we can't change. We can't change subject, right? You can't change the statement of purpose as or induced. Because as or induced, there's a change. You can change the, I'm at 17, the act title. Okay, we can change that. If we strike all the bill, can we change the purpose? No, because that doesn't get struck. It won't go anywhere, I'll just be seeing that as introduced. Yeah. You'll be doing a strike all of the text of the bill. Okay. So if we wanted to change this, we would have to have a committee bill. Yes. The way this would be framed, usually, as a committee amendment to this bill. Yeah. I report by the committee amendment of this bill. Especially to start a whole new bill, which is a committee bill. Right, so I just, there was some questions about the statement of purpose. So let's just read the statement of purpose and see if there are things that people need to change about that. Are there problems with the purpose? Yes. Representative Mattis. Uh, yesterday, the state board said they don't publish data. Right. Right. Yeah, sorry. Thank you. That's why I have the A and B question there. That has to change, right? So that does have to change. Can we just add, like, that doesn't identify a student? That's in there. It's in there. It's in there. That's where the green possible, yeah. So what's the concern to change? But just we need to change the state board of education to agency. Oh, I see. I'm sorry. Yeah. Good. One, Jim, a technical question. What? The statement of purpose refers to the bill as introduced. Correct. That's for the baseline, when H3 was presented, it was this. Had I, you know, as a co-sponsor, had I put in a section about cat food, just throwing a random example out there, it would say something about cat food there, but when the bill passes, the cat food isn't there. Okay, that's true. It's the statement of purpose as introduced. Okay, it's in a completely different bill by the time it gets through the process. Okay. So we're addressing that in the body of the bill. Yeah. We're addressing the language. One other question. The statement of purpose does not go into the green books. Is that correct? That's correct. Okay. Thank you. Also, I'd say the point about the disraise about the State Board of Education changing to AOE, the requirement on page 11 of this bill, which is the current statute, these are the State Board's powers and duties. It says the State Board shall report annually on all of these things, which is where they have to basically be reporting on these different categories. So I'm confused by that comment that the State Board doesn't publish this stuff, because I think it does, it's a part of it. Okay, are we sort of struggling between when we had Commissioner and the Secretary? No, no, I think so. And can I just comment on that as well? I am a big green education book from the School Board Association for Title 16 yesterday. And I looked at the reference here, section 164, and I could pass it around and people really want to see it. There's a whole section about what the State Board reports. So I was conflicted and confused when I heard that testimony yesterday. I think we're stuck at two to report and publish that. That might be it. Yeah, I think you might. Okay, Eric. But isn't that what she said, report? She said publish. Well, she said publish a report. Yeah. So I think they're denying the difference a little bit, because to report on something could be to make someone else's publication known. Yeah, report on something sitting right up here. Right, so I think they don't publish their own report, and maybe that, Jeff is also wrong, but I didn't know that. If you could just take two. Right. So do we have anything about them publishing in Page 4? Since report. Just says report. And the current section of law says report. I'm looking at it right now. Yeah. If you were to go to the Green Books of what exists in law now versus what we're proposing here, just so that we're all on the same page, we have some new members. The language that is presented without a line underneath it or without the strike through is current law. So online 17, that 17 corresponds to the big Green Book of how the education laws are organized, and the additions would be, in this case, there's a struck out school by school has been replaced with supervisory union and school district basis, but the report is already in law. Just not with the specific pieces that we've added on Page 12, starting on line five. Our underlined, the underlined pieces there are what we're adding to their report that already exists. Their reporting requirement, I guess is what I'm asking. And if you look at Page 12, you'll see the language series to the extent that the system was stating federal laws regarding controlling the state of this. So that protects, that privacy, yeah. So I'm a little confused and I think it's in there. We're talking about a technical issue of what we can and can't do here with a bill. The AOE is the group that collects this information. The AOE is the appropriate organization that publishes information. What can we just make it AOE? We can't, I'm here, we can't change the state of the purpose. So we're not worried about, I'm comfortable in not worrying about the state of the purpose at this point because that's going to be long and easy. Okay, very good. But what happens with that data? Would you care about that? That's already in law, right? So it's already in law. It's the report that the report publishes, reports, and the sectioner uses. Yeah, okay. Thank you. Okay, so, and after this, I think it's time for the study standard for public schools. Here we go. Right back to the topic. So, it's the findings. Trevor, I'd be free to move on there. The title of the bill says public schools. I think you have to just worry about the option of doing that as well. So I might affect this, you might wish. Right, and we have, we were supposed to get some testimony, but I think we have a statement, an ENIAS statement that we have out in the past. Um, I'm not sure, was that, was that part of it? I understand in terms of independent schools, that they follow ENIAS, and ENIAS, I think has some strong language about that, but I'm speaking from here, sir. I also think that I saw a message from one of the people saying that they want to be included. Hmm. Did he ask for voluntary, for independent schools, though? Am I right about that? And then the BDA, and we had received testimony also from the NEA saying that they had a preference for this to apply to private schools, but they didn't describe what the mechanism for doing so would be. Can I just take a moment, just introduce Martha Allen, who was president of the Vermont, Hi Martha. NEA, and who is now an equity coordinator for teachers in Vermont, a trained, you know, creating a website for teachers, so, excuse me, I'm sorry. I don't, thank you. I'm gonna see if we can, let's hold that for a minute, let's hold that one, yeah. Well, I'm just wondering, you know, is the, what do we just say, publicly funded schools? So that if you were, you know, to kind of say that if you receive public funding and covered by this, it's the issue that the independent schools might feel they don't have enough of a carved out position in the working group, is that the concern with doing that, or would that be a way to just kind of say, instead of public schools, just publicly funded schools, and that would serve as an umbrella. I'm just about to walk into a tangled area. I think what we don't know is the power, first of all, there's different levels of private schools, so oftentimes we're sort of mistaking the historic academies that operate really just like the public high school with all the others, the red cedars and all that. Right, but like red cedar, they're probably funny. But I'm not sure we have the, we don't know yet if we have the agency of education that has the power. Do you have any thoughts, Jim? Sorry, this wraps it up. Yeah, yeah. But, can you repeat the question, sir? Yeah, yeah. We are wondering in terms of, straight down to the public schools, we're wondering where the independent schools fit in on this, and I will get someone in from the public, the independent to speak to us, but do you have any thoughts on what our parameters are with that? I think there's one simple way, even from public schools in terms of curriculum, they're more independent in terms of that. So there might be an angle there. In terms of which schools to include if you did, if you included approved independent schools to cover those schools that received public tuition, they also cover those schools who are approved that don't receive public tuition, which are some of the sectarian schools like Rice. So you have a choice to make there, as to whether it's all approved independent schools or approved independent devices, or only approved independent schools that take public tuition. Personally, I think we're just talking about them that take public tuition. I don't want to get into Rice's questions. In terms of the ACT title, we can amend the ACT title. Could we amend it to say an act relating to ethnic and social equity study standards for Vermont's education system? That sounds like it could be brought up with a put secondary. Okay, that's a challenge. Yeah. Yeah. So we don't want to dictate post-secondary, I would guess. No, we don't. And then I have a quick question. I just texted Maggie Lenz to start with. Yeah. Do we want to hold on this one? Do you have a language? So we can't, we can't say we can't. We can't add approved independent schools. It's also a decision by you, it's your choice. Approval to the schools are, some of those are approved. Right. Some of them are approved, and they haven't seen public funding. So you can exclude those if you want to. Is there a way to, is there a way to address it? What would be the language to address those that are receiving public dollars? I would say approved independent schools that receive public tuition, basically. Maybe not that language exactly. Yeah. So let's just look at that. We're going to try to find Patty Kamala and then represents the independent schools. Just say what that language is. It's on the, it's right here at the bottom of page one and it's on page 18. Works for schools. But it's just still something we need to do. Or not. Or not? We could say, let's not have that right now. It could be addressed in the Senate. You just have to be ready to address that on the floor. Yeah. Yeah. Perhaps you could just strike for public schools and just say an act relating to ethnic and social equity studies standards. This is the act title. It is not the text of the bill. Education standard. That doesn't necessarily get the end of under school because they're not required to follow standards. You know what? We're going to get bogged down there. Let's come back to that one. All right. So the findings, you know, we have one request where it says indigenous, any place where it says indigenous, we call it abnaki and indigenous. And other indigenous. And other indigenous. People, yeah. Yeah. Everybody okay with that one? Yeah, I'm fine with it. But it exists in a quotation. So it's, if we change the quotation, we got to take out the quotation. You're right. Okay. So let's, so we probably can't do it there because it's a quote, very good catch. I'm glad you're on our committee. But it shows up in other places like in the definition of ethnic groups. Right. So thank you. So we don't want to address any of the findings. It's a quote, good catch. So starting on page four then, you would have it in the definitions. And we would have it, yes, we have it in the definitions. So these are findings. And does anybody have any problems with the findings? Thank you. I'm still bothered by line 16 on page two. In some instances, yeah, in some instances, teachers imply curriculum materials and lesson plans that promote racial stereotypes as a quote. I don't like that, it's tricky. One of the many problems highlighted was this is a quote. So you don't want that quote in there. Even though it's something that they did wrong. It's a finding from another study. It relates to, in my mind, it relates to all teachers promote racial stereotypes. For some reason, I can't, I just can't. It does say in some instances. Well, it's also saying the curriculum materials promote racial stereotypes for teachers. Right. The teachers employ the curriculum materials. Okay, so your concern is, you're feeling this implicates all teachers? That's what I'm seeing here. If there was a word between promote and racial, like inaccurate. Well, again, we're in the middle of a course. Oh, I see. Anyone else? I had, you know, it took me a few reads on that sentence to understand it when I first read the findings last year. But when you read it, it's referring to materials in 2003. Not to say that materials would have changed much today. We don't know. This group is trying to find out. But curriculum, clearly if it's not, we've identified a problem that the curriculum, in many cases, might not represent all peoples in our history. We've heard a lot of testimony to that effect. And here, given that the fighting is now 15 years old and a relevant piece of the historical record, I think it's an important piece of information that guides our thinking in adopting this bill and moving it through the process. I mean, as I look at it, I think that in some instances it does make it clear that this isn't necessarily something that's applying to all teachers or all curricula. But the way that the quotation is inserted without an ellipses is a little strange to me because from 15 to 16, one of the many problems highlighted was, quote, curriculum issues in the state public schools. It reads like its own sentence, but in fact, we don't know what the first half of the sentence was in the quotation. So it's a little different than Larry's point, but as I look at it more closely, I think that quotation could have been a little more, maybe a little less artfully inserted and a little more accurately inserted. I'm not saying that it's missing the point. It's just that I usually don't like to see a sentence as half made in the partial quotation. Nothing bogged down into diagramming sentences here. We could move the quote, the quote at the end of the state's public schools, take the quote off from the word before curriculum, state's public schools, put a call on there, then start the quote in some instances. And again, to bog down in diagramming sentences, it does say in some instances it's like my teacher's employing curriculum, but the curriculum and the materials promote, not the teachers promote. So one of the problems highlighted at that time was curriculum issues of the state public schools period and then the quote. Yeah. So don't quote the curriculum issues. Is anybody moving the quote? I am, I'm not trying to get bogged down. You mean to take now curriculum issues in the state public schools? So one of the many problems highlighted, we could say in 2013, I mean, 2003, get rid of the quote, one of the problems was in 2003 was curriculum issues in the state's public schools. That removes the editorializing of the placement of the quote. Stating that quote. And if you really wanna sort of remove the emphasis off of teachers, we can move the whole beginning of the quote to quote curriculum materials and lessons plans that promote racial stereotypes. And it's really, I'm talking about only materials. So we could actually put the quote at the quote at the curriculum materials. Yeah. That some schools continue to employ curriculum materials and lesson plans. Okay. I've got a couple of questions in there. I'm sort of comfortable with that. Yeah, I just like to make it clear when you're putting together an explanatory sentence with a quotation into one sentence, I don't know, English major here. Sorry. No. And over here, if you were English major. I wasn't the head of the newspaper editor. Yeah. Yeah, if we can't lie, I'm gonna go ahead and head over there. Oh yeah, like, look out. And I talk to people with language disabilities, so let's do it before we do so. All right, Tim, you got that cleared off? Well, not quite, so, come on. There are a couple of different versions here. So the version I wrote down doesn't make sense. So I've got one of the many problems highlighted at that time was, take away the quote, curriculum issues in the state's public schools, comma, and then some connection there to the quotation on curriculum materials and lesson plans. That connection's not clear. I think you just keep the period and capital I in some instances. No, still not within the quote. And the quote would begin at curriculum. It referenced curriculum. Okay, so. Okay, so agreeing that back, one of the m