By Alice Waugh
At Town Meeting on March 29, residents approved spending up to $250,000 to come up with options and cost estimates for school renovation projects, but not without considerable discussion and a number of dissenting votes—though not enough to derail the measure, which required a two-thirds majority vote.
[Read more…] about Residents approve up to $250,000 for another school study
To the editor:
Before us at Town Meeting will be a warrant article to approve funds to study costs associated with fixing our town’s school buildings. The school building’s needs have been professionally studied for 12 years, yet it’s said at meetings that people may not believe that the needs are real. On paper the school building’s needs may seem distant, debatable, and unrelated to learning. As a parent, however, I consistently see how the building’s needs are affecting children and how they’re related to learning, health and safety.
Our daughter’s classroom has been a stagnant 76 to 78 degrees this winter. She’s been telling us that it’s too hot, that it makes her feel sick and dizzy and that she can’t think. Maintenance sounds like an easy fix, but this classroom is stuck in a “difficult to fix” zone of the outdated Univent heating system. The teacher has had to open the windows and door this winter to provide intermittent relief. In December parents were notified that a Univent motor burned out and filled a second grade classroom with smoke, causing the school to be evacuated. While there was no fire, a situation like this speaks to the importance of having a fire suppression system in the schools, yet we have none.
In the spring, fans will again be brought into classrooms to compensate for the building’s decreased ventilation rates and lack of dehumidification. Opening the windows may sound like an easy fix to increase air flow, but what happens to the children with asthma and allergies that are exacerbated by outdoor pollen, and what happens to the attention and learning of the children who are distracted by the noise from ongoing recess? Sometimes it’s not possible to open the windows.
When this is your child’s everyday learning environment, it becomes clear quickly that the building is making the act of learning more difficult than it needs to be. Support of this warrant article will help further identify costs so we can move beyond studying the problems and get to fixing the problems. The town’s school buildings are telling us a story and it’s my hope that we will both listen and respond with urgency, ensuring the health and safety of children and the delivery of education in this town for generations to come.
Sincerely,
Betsey Yeats
35 Round Hill Road
Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters must be about a Lincoln-specific topic. Letters containing personal attacks, errors of fact or other inappropriate material will not be published. Letters may be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor.
To the editor:
Minuteman High School, which provides career and technical education to Lincoln students, has proposed a revised regional agreement as a warrant article for the March 29 town meeting at the Brooks Auditorium. For this new regional agreement to come into effect, it must be approved by a majority at the town meetings of every member town. It is important that stakeholders such as yourselves be aware and informed about the new Agreement so that you and your community can make informed decisions about it. To that end, informational material about the new agreement can be found here along with a seven-minute video explaining the agreement.
Minuteman is a vital resource to the community. Providing a rigorous and relevant curriculum that prepares students for both college and careers is only the first part of our role in Lincoln. We provide education for post-graduate students who seek additional training in order to achieve career readiness. We offer community education programs that enrich the lives of the young and old with new learning opportunities. Our students are involved in community projects across our district. Our restaurant and other service-oriented shops welcome visitors for excellent and affordable service.
In order to continue offering this excellent education and these other services, Minuteman must adapt. One way that we are attempting to achieve this change is by amending the current regional agreement, which will allow the district to move on from a regional agreement that no longer serves the best interests of our students. In brief, the revised agreement makes the following changes:
These changes are the result of years of work by the administration of Minuteman High School, the Minuteman School Committee, subcommittees and task forces made up of local stakeholders, and local government representatives. The revised agreement reflects the input of every member community and represents a hard-earned compromise between these communities.
The article will be heard at Lincoln Town Meeting, which begins at 9:30 a.m. on March 29 at the Brooks Auditorium. Please take some time to review the linked materials or watch the video and express your opinion at town meeting this Saturday.
Sincerely,
Edward Bouquillon, Minuteman High School Superintendent-Director
10 Mill St., Lincoln
Brendan Dutch, Minuteman High School Communications Coordinator
Plymouth, Mass.
Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters must be about a Lincoln-specific topic. Letters containing personal attacks, errors of fact or other inappropriate material will not be published. Letters may be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor.
By Alice Waugh
Candidates for local office shared their views at a March 15 forum, starting things off with answers to a resident’s question about what selectman candidates and the town learned from the failure of the school building project vote and the Route 2 tree-cutting issue.
[Read more…] about Candidate forum draws questions on school, Route 2
By Alice Waugh
In response to residents’ requests at a multiboard meeting to discuss school renovations, officials made a last-minute change in the Town Meeting agenda so the School Committee could ask for money to find out what exclusively town-funded school renovations might cost.
The Lincoln-Sudbury Regional District School Committee will hold its next meeting in the Hartwell multipurpose room meeting on Tuesday, Jan. 28 at 7:30p.m. The agenda can be found here.
By Alice Waugh
School will start next fall after Labor Day and end by June 24 if the School Committee votes in favor of the proposed calendar at its January 23 meeting.
Partly due to unhappiness in some quarters over how late the 2012-13 school year ran, the committee surveyed parents about their preferences in regard to when the school year would start and whether to have no school on Rosh Hashanah, Good Friday, and a day set aside for parent/teacher conferences.
Fifty-nine percent of the 363 survey respondents preferred school to start after Labor Day, according to a letter to parents from Superintendent of Schools Becky McFall.
Thirty percent of parents and faculty who responded said they thought school should not be in session on the religious holidays. If school were held on those days, McFall said in her letter that the school would have to hire 12 to 19 substitutes to compensate for staff who were absent as one or more of their five paid personal days. “Finding this many substitutes on a given day would compromise instruction and place a high logistical burden on the district,” she wrote.
If the calendar is approved, school will start on Tuesday, Sept. 2, 2014 and end on June 24, 2015 if all five snow days are used.
Classroom heating system malfunctionsFollowing is an email sent to Lincoln School parents on Thursday morning, Jan. 9 by Mary Sterling, Assistant Superintendent for the Lincoln Public Schools.
“I am contacting families of Lincoln School students to let you know about a minor incident that has been resolved. We experienced a malfunction with the heating system in Cheri Wing-Jones’s second grade classroom this morning. This caused some smoke in the heating unit. The system was shut down, the class was cleared immediately and the building was evacuated. Students and staff followed all fire drill procedures. The fire department responded quickly and determined that the building was fully safe for occupancy. There remains a slight odor in Cheri’s classroom and we have decided to relocate them to the library for the day. We expect the classroom to be fully functional tomorrow. All students are responding well. We will continue to monitor them throughout the day. Please contact Steve McKenna or Sharon Hobbs if you have any questions or concerns.”
Codman Community Farms is now selling six-month shares in its meat CSA (community-supported agriculture) program. From January to June, those who pay who pay $600 will get 10 pounds per month of Codman-raised grass-fed beef and naturally fed pork packed for you each month. Sign up on the Codman Community Farms website or call 781-259-0456.
Visitors can also buy a 10-pound bag of mixed cuts of Codman beef for $120. Limited quantities available; visit the farm office from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Mondays and Wednesdays and purchase from Barbara Rhines or Eric Robichaud.
Are you looking for a place to hold a large meeting? Do you want to have a party but your space is too small? Consider renting Bemis Hall, which has a 2,000-square-foot space with a stage and piano that’s appropriate for lectures, concerts, performances, private receptions and parties, business functions, memorial services, and recitals. The hall available for rental weekday evenings after 5 p.m., Saturday all day, and Sunday after noon.
The upstairs hall has 129 metal folding chairs without arms, 14 white stackable chairs with arms, two 5-foot tables, seven 6-foot tables, and six 8-foot tables for use by renters at no additional charge. In addition, renters are welcome to use the hall’s audiovisual system, including speakers, microphones, projector, computer, and Blu-Ray player.
For information, availability and rental application, go to the Bemis Hall page on the town website (www.lincolntown.org –> Community Services –> Facilities). Questions? Contact Bemis Hall coordinator Barbara Low 781-259-8341 or barbara_low@hotmail.com.
By Alice Waugh
As they mull several options for the 2014-15 academic calendar, school officials are asking parents about whether or not to start school before Labor Day and whether to have school on certain religious holidays.
[Read more…] about Parents surveyed on 2014-15 school calendar
By Alice Waugh
Lincoln will not be eligible for any state funding for a school building project in the near future, according to a letter received by school officials on December 6.
[Read more…] about State says no to Lincoln’s school building application