| 0:00:06 | The recording joins in progress | The first two rows of the dialogue file are unattributed fragments — "Next year." and "Attendance are here for." — and the chair's own first line at 0:00:17 opens "Here are spread. Heather Whitney here." The call to order, the Pledge and the first names of the roll are not on the recording. Attendance for this page is therefore taken from the minutes, not the video. | OBSERVATION |
| 0:02:21 | How to read the charts | Koski: "Be go with science scores. And we couple pieces of information. Blue below. Proficiency red. Getting there. Yellow is at or above proficient. The solid line is the state average for New Hampshire of last year. They haven't published their state average for this year. And the dotted line is our scores from the year prior. Oh okay. The bright spot here is that high school scored by the state average." The colour key and both reference lines exist only in this spoken description; the slides are not published. | MEDIUM |
| 0:02:52 | Science: "our score from last year, which was 39%" | Koski, verbatim: "If you look at our score from last year, which was 39% huge improvement due to move up, and so really proud of that. And we are close to getting close to the state average in eighth grade, still pretty far behind in fifth grade elementary school." The 39% is the only science figure spoken with a number attached, and the sentence around it is garbled enough that this page will not say which grade or which year it belongs to. The minutes' version of the same point: "Mr. Koski noted that the 11th grade strongly outperformed previous years in science." | OBSERVATION MEDIUM |
| 0:03:18 | Science statewide context | Koski: "these these large blue buyers [bars] are concerned, but for whatever reason, state the science schools across the state. And probably because of the gaps in between those tests tend to score very low statewide. So the statewide average in the 40s or the high 30s is, is is kind of rough. But our, our 11th grade students really did themselves compared to years past." At 0:03:52 he credited "Doctor Harrington" — Stevens principal Michael Herrington — with "pretty impassioned speech to the junior class prior to the test", plus science teachers' work with the state's practice sets, and noted there was "much less of that at the, elementary level". | OBSERVATION |
| 0:04:58 | ELA: a cohort followed grade to grade | Koski: "here are Ela scores… Some of the bright spots. Fifth grade almost get to the state. Average dotted line scores from last year… if we look at fourth grade Ela scores, the dotted line would have been this year's fifth grade class." At 0:05:36: "you can see a big improvement through for those students via their fifth grade teachers… Likewise, we see some areas where scores of fallen from from year to year… from sixth grade last year to seventh grade. This year we see pretty big drop in those scores." At 0:06:07: "we're not quite there yet with proficiency. But we are seeing some I guess, for lack of a better term, green spro[uts]". No ELA percentages are spoken. | OBSERVATION |
| 0:08:02 | iReady against NH SAS — the numbers do not line up | Koski: "The sass test, certainly for third grade. For fifth grade, they scored much higher on the Sass test than they did on the I ready on the I ready test. Whoops. So fifth grade proficiency on IRA [iReady] was only 36%." Then at 0:08:22, complete: "Fifth grade on the Sass test was 48%." Those two figures make iReady the lower measure — but the approved minutes record the opposite conclusion: "there is higher proficiency demonstrated by iReady than SAS, particularly in reading, so it may not be as valid." His own caution at 0:08:26: "be cautious with the irony [iReady] reading scores because they look a little aggressive for the younger kids." Without Exhibit A a reader cannot settle which way round the comparison runs. | OBSERVATION MEDIUM |
| 0:09:52 | Turnover and leadership, not free-and-reduced lunch | Answering the chair's question about differences between schools and any correlation with free-and-reduced-lunch rates, Koski: "This year we had some schools, struggled with, leadership situations and teacher turnover and that seemed to very much impact their scores. Other schools have little more study [steady] situation and those students perform better. In terms of direct correlation between kind of socioeconomic status or free and reduced lunch. No, we we really have such a large population." At 0:10:42: "Yeah, I would move more towards instructional practice… we've got the right programs in place. We've got the right curriculum in place. We've just got to get the instructional practice elevated across the district to to really see the scores come up." | |
| 0:11:21 | Petrin: "kids are doing poorly because adults are doing poorly" | Petrin: "So this is what frustrates me is that kids are doing poorly because adults are doing poorly. Is what I'm hearing as well, which is part of it. Yeah. But we have we have instructional coaches, which is optional, is encouraged, but it's not. But if we know we have adults that are not teaching to the level they should be, they should." At 0:11:46: "My opinion, there should be some required professional development or you will do this. You will have this coaching." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:18:04 | Madden: the state average as a ceiling | Madden: "The way it's presented. You have it looks like a ceiling with the average state score." At 0:18:14: "That's a failure. Now, it would be an achievement for our situation right now." And at 0:18:25: "We got to raise the bar dramatically… But even the way we're presenting it, okay, we're presenting very low expectations. Well, I would disagree, I don't think. But if that's the way it's received, that's not well, that's the way I would see it. I'm a hard ass." Koski's reply is merged into the same diarized segment. | OBSERVATION |
| 0:19:13 | Test opt-outs and the participation rate | Madden: "All the all the students, the parents that are allowing the students to opt out, get a zero." At 0:19:21: "I think we should make it uncomfortable to opt out… Why don't we make them sign a form and they got to come into the school and sign the form?" And at 0:20:11: "No, but that's that's our required participation rate." The administration declined: minutes, "Mr. Koski explained they cannot put barriers in place for a state rule, but that the district had above 95% participations which is the requirement." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:23:36 | Math: fourth grade "below 20%… up near 40%" | Koski: "here are the math SAT [SAS] scores again. Yellow proficient. You see fourth grade making a big improvement. This is their score in third grade below 20%. Now they're up near 40%. So that group has made a big improvement in their math scores." On the new math programme, at 0:24:09: "this is when they didn't have it. This is when they did… this this this year's was the first year after that program is instituted. State math average, not a ceiling… So we are again all over the place with growth or loss. But some signs of, of improvement." The minutes record a correction the chair drew out on the record: the prior-year data predates the new math programme, this year's does not. | OBSERVATION |
| 0:25:10 | iReady math figures, spoken once | Koski: "the irony [iReady], math scores. So third, fourth and fifth, right around 40% low 30s for, for fifth grade if we flip back fifth grades 28, fourth grades 39, 27." Quoted exactly as spoken; the run of numbers at the end is not resolvable from audio alone and the minutes carry no iReady math figures at all. At 0:25:50: "the early grades show higher on the irony scores. We get lower as we go higher in the grade." | OBSERVATION MEDIUM |
| 0:29:52 | The chair: "is there a reason that we are not mandating test prep universally?" | Whitney: "When I went on the New Hampshire Doe website to kind of get a better understanding of what the Sass was about, sure. They had a bunch of test prep resources for schools. I guess the question that I have is, is there a reason that we are not mandating test prep universally?" Koski at 0:30:16: "I don't know if mandate is probably we're just shy of mandating it," describing modular sample questions and an interim practice test run at all schools this year, time-bounded although "The Sass test has no time limit". At 0:31:16: "We could certainly spend more time on test prep, get into that debate about, you know, how much is too much… we can be happy to take direction from the board." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:32:40 | The teacher evaluation tool is bargained, not board-set | Koski: "teacher evaluation tool is part of the negotiated contract. Correct. And so when when that comes up for negotiation, that'll be part of the negotiations I believe I'm not putting words in your mouth, Mr. Pratt. No, we." Pratt at 0:32:55 described trying "to tackle it under the… collective bargaining agreement", and at 0:33:20: "we weren't able to use Esser [ESSER] funds. So now we're just trying to find something that's affordable. And they're really expensive right now." This is the statutory answer to the board's interest in mandating professional development for particular teachers. | OBSERVATION |
| 0:40:17 | Howard's caution against pointing at teachers | Howard: "Maybe they're seen as some sort of way. So before too quickly jumping into pointing fingers at an individual teacher, I…" and at 0:40:42: "there might be cases where teachers feel that way, but their students excel. So it could go either way." Hawkins added at 0:43:32: "I just want to clarify, I was in no way suggesting publicly no, no, that I was not know. Believe me, I would never do th[at]". No teacher was named in public session at any point in the recording. | OBSERVATION |
| 0:42:39 | How teacher-level data actually circulates | Asked whether a teacher can see how they compare with peers "blind", Koski: "that is actually happening at all the schools. They each have the data teams, these have leadership teams." At 0:43:04: "they do so in grade level meetings. The triangles come out and and they look at their data, and so they can see and[…]" — teachers are not named, though per the minutes they "know who they are". At 0:44:29 he described the disaggregations available: "All of the math is broken down into numbers and operations, algebraic thinking, geometry graphs and Ela into…" | OBSERVATION |
| 0:44:47 | Where the chair asked the resources to go | Whitney: "if you were going to say the top three…" and at 0:45:03: "If we have resources that must be mustered, where should they be mustered?" Koski's answer, at 0:45:24: professional development first, "partly because, you know, I think we're reducing our turnover"; then physical instructional materials — at 0:46:34: "we're we're sorely lacking science materials at the elementary leve[l]"; then consistency of building-level leadership and staff retention. Hawkins added time at 0:49:13: "Time is is a resource that I think we're short of." | |
| 0:49:30 | Grade 11 School Day SAT | Koski: "This is the SAT scores. A little bit awkward of a graph I apologize. Students who are scoring below expectation here. The national averages for SAT scores. We have 50% ish of our students there. We have a little over 10% scoring above that, but still a good chunk below in both math and in English." At 0:50:05: "we are a state that tests everybody. Not all states do that. So you'll see states like Alabama and Nebraska and their in their 1200s for a combined score. Where we're in the 1050 range. But a lot of that is selection of who gets to take the test." Conclusion at 0:50:29: "we nationally score as a state above the national average, but, we as a district are a little bit below that right now." | OBSERVATION |
| 0:51:54 | Instructional coaches move to the elementary schools | Pratt: "you have to take consideration the skill set, the population of kids that they're working with. And so the plan moving forward enough next to the year after that is that we want each school to have their own elementary coach. We have three elementary schools. We have three budgeted positions for elementary coaches. So all our resources for elementary coaches will go at the early, early years." At 0:52:45: "next year would be the, you know, the final year that we will, you know, for coaches for the middle school and high school, we are going to move them one to each elementary school." Confirmed for school year 2026-27. No vote was taken. | OBSERVATION |
| 0:54:05 | Social workers: needed, unavailable, spread thin | Pratt: "we've been down social workers over the years. The need for social workers, have grown tremendously. But we're finding is that we need them, but they're just not out there… social workers address student attendance behaviors, mental health issues." At 0:55:00: "The ones that we have now, I think, spread very thin." Petrin and Whitney proposed an assistant or "Social worker extender" role; Pratt said "just to be an assistant social worker, you have to have you have" qualifications the district cannot readily meet, and that the district contracts with outside agencies where it can. | OBSERVATION |
| 1:04:57 | Two Plymouth State interns — attribution differs | The segment opens with a board member's question merged into the speaker's cluster: "What is that program, Mr. Pratt? That's Plymouth State and that's our psychologist, because we've been having a hard time finding psychologists that, Mike McCusker [McCosker] had come to me and said, hey, can I reach out to the schools and see if this is something we can do? And, we found two people". The dialogue file attributes this to Superintendent Pratt; the approved minutes attribute the same report to Business Administrator Mary Henry — "Mary Henry shared that the district has two psychology interns through a partnership with Plymouth State starting next year." Both cannot be right; this page reports the conflict rather than choosing. | OBSERVATION |
| 1:13:29 | The public-forum committee that wasn't formed | Howard: "I'm very open to suggestion on who membership should be, how we should state the purpose, I think timeline maybe 12 to 18 months, ideally a budget implication of $0." He cited Portsmouth's practice, floated building public engagement into regular meetings instead, and at 1:15:49: "I'm really 50/50 with going forwar[d]". At 1:19:23 he named the origin — "the awkwardness" of not being able to answer public comment. Petrin's caution at 1:24:40: "my only caution is going out as individuals is, like you said, it's going to hear and listen. It's you're not able" to answer for the board. Resolved by naming Petrin the board's representative to the Superintendent's Advisory Committee — no committee formed, no vote recorded in the minutes. | |
| 1:33:16 | Policy subcommittee: working one meeting ahead | Hawkins: "we met this afternoon, and what we're doing is we are looking at policies that will be presented at the following meeting so that we are one step ahead. And I do receive recommendations from the food service coordinator and from the finance subcommittee and from the administration. And I did receive some procedures right before the meeting." At 1:33:51: "Our goal is to get through the priorities so that we are in line with statutes that are currently in place." The subcommittee met the afternoon of the board meeting — a pattern she describes again at 1:50:25: "we do meet every the day of every board meeting before the board meeting." | POSITIVE |
| 1:34:56 | The question that set the night's pattern | Whitney: "Do you think we'll need a second read for this or would you like to try to adopt it?" Hawkins: "I don't think we need a second read. I think that I don't know, we didn't talk about that at our meeting today." No rules-suspension motion was made, and none is recorded in the minutes — in contrast to the May 21 meeting, where the same subcommittee chair said explicitly on the record, "We are suspending our rules for tonight." Four more policies were then adopted the same way. | MEDIUM |
| 1:35:14 | GBEF adopted | Whitney: "I'd like to make a motion to adopt policy GBEF as presented by the policy subcommittee." Madden: "Second." Vote at 1:35:44: "Do we have any discussion about policy GDEF [GBEF]? Seeing none all in favor of adopting the policy as presented by the Policy Committee, say a policy is unanimously adopted." Hawkins had introduced it at 1:33:51 as "the first policy BBF [GBEF] internet access for staff", with Director of Technology Jeff Small's recommendation "to go forward with the with the policy as presented here." The transcript renders the code three different ways in five minutes; the minutes settle it as GBEF. | MEDIUM |
| 1:36:55 | JICL adopted — and the seconder the transcript loses | Hawkins: "So I will move to adopt JICL school district internet access for students. I'll second." The diarizer merged the second into the mover's segment; the chair resolves it immediately at 1:37:02 — "Mr. Howard seconds" — and the minutes agree: "Arlene Hawkins made a motion to adopt policy JICL as presented, Loren Howard seconded the motion." Vote at 1:37:07: "All in favor of adopting policy J. I see l as presented by the policy subcommittee. Say a a saying no opposition policy is adopted. First reading." The chair's own words — "adopted. First reading" — are the clearest statement on the record of what happened five times this night. | MEDIUM |
| 1:37:23 | JICK adopted; two superseded policies await a rescission notice | Hawkins: "The next policy is JICK pupil safety and violence prevention. We actually right now have two separate policies. And this is consolidated into one. It's the New Hampshire School Board Association sample and refers primarily to bullying bullying and cyberbullying. It includes consequences of false reporting for retaliation and to protect students from retaliation." Asked whether the old policies must be rescinded, she answered at 1:38:08: "that's next after we adopt? But what we're doing because we have to have seven days notice for withdrawing, that'll be at our next meeting." The consolidating policy therefore takes effect while the two policies it replaces remain formally in force. Motion and vote at 1:38:23, Madden seconding. | MEDIUM |
| 1:39:03 | IHBA adopted — special-education safeguards | Hawkins: "The next one is I h be a [IHBA] programs for students with disabilities. This is a revision. The one that we currently have is…" and at 1:39:37: "this just confirms that in a policy and people can parents can get the safeguards either through the building level a[nd]…". Motion, second and vote at 1:39:57, all in one segment: "I'd like to make a motion that the board adopts as presented by the policy subcommittee policy. I h be a second, Mr. Madden, in seconds… all in favor of adopting policy? I h be a as presented by the policy subcommittee say I seeing it on oppose policies adopted." | MEDIUM |
| 1:40:50 | CHCA: the wrong version in the packet | Hawkins: "This is not the revised one. So I'm going to defer. I guess that's going to hold up a process." At 1:41:22: "those revisions should be in here and they're not. So I apologize for that." Pratt urged proceeding anyway — "You can adopt it based on those revisions. I'm sorry. You can adopt it" — and Whitney asked her to "verbalize what those revisions are." Hawkins moved adoption with revisions at 1:41:35, and Howard then read the actual wording into the record at 1:43:21: "The principals and other administrators will prepare the updated copy ready for publication by mid-July for final approval at the August board meeting… But to verbalize it for the public in the minutes, that's[…]". | POSITIVE |
| 1:46:49 | CHCA held for a second read instead | After working out that the board has no July meeting, Whitney at 1:46:37: "So I want to just do this a first read and[…]"; Hawkins: "Let's make this a first read." The motion, at 1:46:49: "move policy CACA [CHCA] to second read with amendments and additions that were made in this meeting, including the date in which the board will approve." Petrin seconded; carried at 1:47:07. The board also wrote its own approval deadline into the policy — Whitney at 1:45:26: "Should we include that, it would be voted on, approved by the board in the first meeting in August." | POSITIVE |
| 1:48:13 | ADC revised and adopted — a 2004 policy replaced | Hawkins: "the one that we have is from 2004. There's this revised 2024 to include these e-cigarettes. And we're going to do the same thing." Whitney at 1:48:23: "is the board comfortable adopting this without a second read? If I make a motion to that effect okay. I'd like to make a motion to adopt the revised policy a c d," corrected in the next breath at 1:48:36 to "a d c" with Madden seconding, and closing "And we're now compliant there." No ADC exhibit is in the packet folder, and the record does not identify the statute or rule the board is now "compliant" with. | MEDIUM |
| 1:48:57 | Seven more policies queued, and fiscal procedures promised | Hawkins: "for our next meeting we will be bringing forward seven additional. Most of them are priorities. We have the ones from the finance subcommittee. We have one from the food services director. We have several that deal with attendance to consolidate the numbers of policies we have from 3 to 1." At 1:49:34: "Procedural safeguards for special education, security and alternative learning plans and conduct discipline and due proc[ess]". Whitney at 1:51:00: "Mary, thank you for getting those procedures… Miss Henry is going to be working on those procedures to make sure that we have links to those procedures and that we are we are battening down the hatches, making sure that, any financial management irregularities are going to be ameliorated." Hawkins at 1:51:29: "the procedures will be on the website". | POSITIVE |
| 1:57:48 | Honor-roll process and graduation | Madden: "I sent you an email, but maybe it didn't get conveyed, but I was hoping that we could follow the approved honorable [honor roll] process for Stevens, especially for the senior class before graduation." At 1:58:22: "I know that we have at least one very high performing student who wasn't accepted to their first choice college. And who knows if, you know, putting one more line on their resume, saying high honors every year, maybe it would have tipped the scales. So this is just another thing we have to clean up." Pratt: "having it for the day after tomorrow would be a tough sell." No vote; the meeting adjourned by consent. | |