Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: We're live.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Okay, we're live. Senate Education Committee January. We're continuing our effort to get a feel for the round remark about superintendents especially and others

[Nader Hashim (Member)]: the map proposed

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: by the agency and also gender of mixed mass. It's sort of reacting to either one, either or both, and the notion of that general. We're starting off today with Jane McGarney, who we had confirmed before, specific questions. So we all actually, we'll wrap the committee quickly.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Ram Hinsdale, Chittenden County.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Audrey Sheen, Windham County. Dave Reese, Rutland County. Seth Bongartz and Pennington, South District.

[Terry Williams (Clerk)]: Terry Williams from Rutland District. Steve Heffernan from Addison County. Thanks.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Thanks for having me. So my name is JD Canarney, and I serve as the superintendent of schools for the White River Valley Supervisory. I'm gonna call the supervisor evening WRBSU moving forward for the remainder of my testimony. I'm now in the midst of my six years superintendent schools at WRVSU. And prior, I served as principal for seven years at Williamstown Schools. This marks my fifteenth year as an education administrator in Vermont, and the WRVSU serves approximately 1,700 students across 10 towns and three counties, Addison, Orange, and Ventura. I want to thank the Senate Education Committee for allowing us the opportunity to testify today on Act 73, the specific focus on the school redistricting maps that have been proposed by Secretary Saunders late last week. I want to begin my testimony by thanking you for your continued consideration and support of the supervisory system as a viable governance structure for the law schools. I've testified previously about why I strongly support the supervisory union structure, and once again need to emphasize that my reasoning for the strong and unconditional support of the Supervisory Union School Government structure is grounded in my core belief of transforming education. Vermont deserves systems that best serve our students' communities and provide the best possible roadmap to strengthen our schools while also increasing student achievement both socially, emotionally, and academically. I will share Vermont specific data that supports the fact that multi district supervisory means have demonstrated more fiscal efficiency over the past several years as compared to single town and multi town supervisory districts. In addition, the supervisory to the government structure preserves local democracy and enhances school accountability through the preservation of local school district rules.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Can I ask a clarifying question? So the maps presented by AOE had only districts and the map presented by BEG had supervisory district. Okay. But AOE had only district.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Yes. Yep. Thanks, Heather.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Yeah. I'm just taking a try and help who are doing that.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: My testimony is predominantly focused on secretary Okay. Okay. Therefore, my immediate reaction to secretary Saunders' maps is one of immediate and grave concerns due to the fact that they do not include supervisory structure as a means of future school governance. Instead, the secretary's proposed maps rely on the supervisory district governance structure, which will immediately strip away any and all local democracy oversight and accountability. In addition, it will result in proposed supervisory district boards that are depersonalized to to Vermont students. I don't have any idea how a board member from Hancock is supposed to have any on the ground feel, knowledge, or perspective on how a school is performing or meeting the needs of students, families, and communities served in Springfield, as would be the case in the BSBA hybrid map introduced last Thursday, January 15. I wanna also be really clear. I believe the talk of SUs versus SDs is being misconstrued because it's unfolding with a primary focus as a Mesa and sweet choice. I believe School Choice and Rural Vermont are intertwined often because rural districts either have stopped operating schools or have non operating grades due to the difficult decision to close their operating grades due to requirements faced during F-forty six, as well as the reality of declining enrollment. These decisions were, however, made with the best of intentions to operate as efficiently and effectively as possible to best meet the needs of local students and communities. The discussion we need to have right now is about a unilateral move to large multi town and county supervisory districts like the ones proposed by Secretary Saunders, which would place WRBS Union's supervisory district that has 30 towns, enforces the unilateral top down merger of seven SUs and SDs into just a single supervisory district. As I've said to you all before, I believe that move is one to depersonalize decision making. And I believe it is to make it easier for these newly elected boards to close schools. Otherwise, we'd have SCUs local boards to make those decisions. It also takes all of the decision making from the electorate and places that decision making in the hands of these newly elected boards. In addition, it strips away the role that both the school boards, districts, and communities I serve play in regards to keeping school systems accountable. We need to increase school accountability, not weaken it by taking away the accountability measures closest to Vermont students. The level of satisfaction our local communities are able to obtain of the tools provided to them by locally elected school district boards is critically important. As a pivot, I also want to be clear, a supervisory district that goes from Branville to Springfield, Vermont all the way north from Chelsea and crosses over to Norwich isn't going to allow for a superintendent to serve as instructional leader. That position is going to quickly become disconnected from day to day realities of their schools and rely a highly paid middle management and bureaucracy to get their work done. That's not a vision of educational transformation that I can support. My recommendation is that you no longer entertain the three maps proposed by Secretary Sonnych last week, and you move back to a focused effort on transforming our education system through the strongly researched policies previously provided to you via the use of the cooperative educational service areas and that you request all SUs and SDs to work cooperatively and collaboratively to partner through voluntary school governance restructuring as already provided under current law with an actionable deadline to be determined this session. If you were to require all SUs and SDs to find just one part at the supervisory unit or district level to merge, then it would result in a decrease of SUs and SPs from 52 down to 26. I firmly believe that if you require the field to do this work, that we would actually find more efficiency and get that number down to the lower 20s or even the high teens. It would also allow for the needed time to research which government instruction makes the most sense for that region, research the impact of cost drivers like the merger of collective bargaining agreements, and result in the reduction of redundancy at the Supervisory Union District level without necessarily requiring loss of local democratic control oversight because the Supervisory Union model of governance could be enacted voluntarily by any and all boards. I'm also confident this approach would ensure necessary safeguards are in place so Vermont students don't fall through the cracks or get lost in many of our education transformation efforts. We need to provide stability and predictability to our ever changing education system. Now transformational efforts should result in our educational leaders' focus being diverted away from seats. Promise you, the SDs with 30 towns that result in nearly a two hour car drive to get to one end of its border to the other isn't going to deliver on the promise of school transformation, which is focused on increasing academic and social emotional outcomes. Instead, it's going to focus on trying to soothe the pain and upset of her communities, resulting in greater time spent on management and significantly less time spent on instructional leadership where it continues to be. And I testify on that based on within our SU, remember, merged two SUs merged together, and we did a bunch of merger of single town districts into unified school districts. Those districts that felt like they were forced to merge versus those that were voluntarily merged, the ones that felt forced, I came on two years after those mergers already occurred and I spent my first three trying not to get them to decouple because they felt it was done to them versus those that were voluntarily negotiated at the school district level. So I want to emphasize that I'm completely supportive of a change in the education funding formula and believe that our current funding formula consists of too many variables to provide predictable tax rates year to year. This is in large part due to the complexity and the variety of variables that play a role in the finalized residential tax rate. Therefore, I believe that the legislature should continue to study, analyze, work to fix the funding for the Fund with increased research and attention specific to the foundation I'm also interested in further exploration and testimony on s two twenty because I agree and fully understand that we need to take immediate action to stabilize the education fund while school transformation efforts take hold.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: You have Do we have that testimony? Mhmm.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Yes. We we need to ensure that our school transformation efforts result in highly functioning education and counseling systems that include benchmarks for increased academic growth year over year per pupil spending oversight via the implementation of required school districts to comply when an excess spending threshold in the event that the foundation formula isn't implemented or parameters provided via S220 and continued implementation of minimum class sizes as guidelines for staffing. Failure to meet annual accountability measures should result in technical assistance from the Agency of Education that includes that school boards need to provide annual progress monitoring benchmarks that indicate transparency, strategic planning, and SUSD leadership accountability standards that are actually aligned to superintendent evaluation processes. It's critical that we are clear with our communities on the state of our schools and we need to make certain that continuous improvement is a transparent system for the ultimate goal of implementing high quality school improvement. I want to conclude by indicating that I'm in agreement that something needs to be done in order to alleviate profit and tax pressures. We need to increase student achievement and social emotional growth, and we also need to increase accountability and efficiency across Vermont's educational system. I don't believe time spent on mapping is going to get you to that place. I and actually address those athletes' concerns that need to be attention. I think you should analyze the parts of act 73 that provide a road map to reaching the intent of legislation and adjust the parts of the legislation that are creating barriers to reaching that intent. I don't believe more moving forward with the drawing of maps is going to result in the intent and desire to have outcomes. I also call on you to stop any more debate regarding Supervisory Unions versus Supervisory Districts and reaffirm your commitment to local democracy, efficiency and accountability, And be clear that any and all school transformation will include both, SUs and STs. The debate around these governance structures is distracting from the real work that needs to be done to create better outcomes for our students. I've heard testimony recently that says that SU's can't coordinate special services support for students and that students are more apt to fall through the cracks within an SU structure if they move from one district to the next. I would welcome anyone has those concerns to come visit WRDSU. We coordinate our special services at the SU level, our curriculum is coordinated at the SU level, our policies are coordinated at the SU level, our food service is coordinated at the SU level. We can do all those things that we keep hearing are efficient at the ST level, at the SU level. The difference being though, I also have accountability measures for each one of those district boards and the constituents of those district boards go to the representatives and make sure they're holding the school system accountable for really strong customer service. Our product in regards to education is our kids. And if our kids are successful and families are happy, then we are doing our jobs. And that's what I get concerned about when we go from multi district SUs to really large by Vermont standards SPs is we're going lose that local accountability measures again back to the system. I believe Vermont understands common sense solutions, the power of local democracy to solve difficult situations, and have asked for a needy, more transparent educational funding system, but not a top down campaign. The good news is that there's still time to implement changes to exit the three that will increase fiscal responsibility, preserve local democracy, increase school accountability, and result in increased student achievement and social mission growth. Our students' futures and our state's viability moving forward are counting on it, and I'm confident that this committee is going to be able to deliver something that leaves those things. Thanks. I really appreciate it. Thank

[Nader Hashim (Member)]: you, doctor. Wanted to turn maybe page two. We hear a lot about accountability. I I I hear a lot about it from my colleagues here. And Sure. Should I see that you're saying that the proposed maps would strip away local democracy and oversight? That's something that we've heard

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: in the past, but that it

[Nader Hashim (Member)]: would also strip away accountability. Can you expand on that a little bit more?

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Yeah. So I get concerned that if we have an SD, as the one I'm testifying to, the hybrid past that's got 30 towns, and let's say that those 30 towns are represented by six board members, that those six board members are not gonna have a good sense of feeling on the ground around how a school is functioning in the corners of that SD, or even in the middle of that SD, because they're not gonna have their constituents to connect with in order to know how things are functioning. One of the things that I'm really pleased about is if one of my schools, something's not going well, those constituents are gonna be able to get to their representatives and I'm gonna know that I've got something I'm gonna take care of. It could be something simple like food service, where we're not we haven't gotten back to a parent or something. And I see that as helping build accountability in the system to ensure that we can react. What I don't want is my constituents to have no idea who they can reach out to in the event that something's not working. I also worry in that larger of a system, senator, that the ability for our constituents to be able to get directly to the CEO or the superintendent, we're gonna rely on a lot more near management. And, you know, I think the quality in regards to leadership and education is improving, but, you know, the last time I had a principal vacancy, I had three candidates and only two were viable. So, you know, one of the things there too is that I do think it relies on us having the ability to train on principals is my point there. And so I get worried about a system that might rely more heavily on middle management. Yes.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So how many high school students are in there? Supervisor do you

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: How many secondary students are in my Nine through 12. I don't know that number off the top of my head.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Okay. Would you say it's, like, roughly 500, like a third of your student?

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: It probably is

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: I'm trying to think how many districts I get. Our enrollment in some districts is higher at the elementary right now. Yeah, it's probably between four fifty and five twenty five, probably somewhere Okay. In

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: And you have three high schools? One high school. So you're a supervisory union, and within that supervisory union, you have towns that have choice.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Yeah, so And they

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: can send their kids to another high school. Mhmm. So what you're saying when you're worried about us when you're worried you're hearing end school choice is still lands for me as you have about 500 high school students and three high schools.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: I don't have three high schools.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: But you have kids who can go to any of the three high schools?

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: So within White River Valley Supervisory, we have one high school. It's White River Valley High School.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Yeah, and we've locked it.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: And so students from my SU can choose to go to White River Valley High School or they can choose to go to any one of the 18 independent schools that are allowed via ACT 73 and any of the old public schools. So we actually, within the White River Valley Supervisory Union, have students going to 35 different secondary schools right now in the state.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So what I think we talked about this a little bit when we visited, but the important thing there, maybe for both of us, is that the foundation formula will give everyone the same amount of money. So they can't choose to go to a number of independent schools at whatever rate they set.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Yeah, I'm very supportive. I think the foundation formula in general makes the tuition system much cleaner and clearer, right? That weight goes with the student.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: And

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: one of the things that it would help for and one of the concerns that I'm hoping to be able testify next week about incentive finance that I have in regards to 02/20 is the idea of how does announced tuition play a role for our school choice town like Grandville Hancock. They don't operate any school. They're a K-twelve choice. They closed their school journey with kids to ensure that we could comply with any type of cap, right? So the tuition ought to be set at the same amount that the cap's being set, much like the way it would go with the student.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I think we agree in that I wish we weren't talking about a temporary cap as much as how we are going to implement the foundation formula sooner and more quickly so that we don't have to create an artificial cap, but we're actually moving towards a fair and equal system for everyone. I think that's what you're saying.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: I agree. Yeah. No. I think absolutely, and I'm glad we came back to this, and I absolutely agree with you visited. Yeah. The foundation for it on the rate going with the student makes this way cleaner in regards to how that works. Okay. Mhmm.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Yeah. And just not paying more for one student to go somewhere and less for another student to go somewhere else.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Stuff like that. I appreciate that. Yeah, thank you.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: So I do feel like you're saying that you are, been it's asking what the subsequent event is, know, what do we do to get rid of the agreement immediately? And I heard you say that you're in support of the test to 20.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: I'm in support of us exploring, right? Like I've got questions. Yeah. But I totally understand that something needs to be done in a more immediate way as we make certain we research the foundation form of the defense work that the foundation form of the work, etcetera. You weren't here last time I testified. My concern right now with the foundation formula is that I hear that we need these really large SDs to spread out the weights essentially, right, for a district that may currently right now need more weight because their free and reduced lunch population sparsity. Combining it with a more affluent district, right, or a higher spending district. I don't think that should be the solution around these weights, that we need to merge those in order to get it right. I agree. And so that, what I was saying last testimony was that's my concern right now. I'm very supportive of the foundation for my life. I don't think it should meet these really mega districts, the bond standards and rule of

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: a bond in order for it to work. Yeah.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: So yes, I think in order to take the time we need to get that right, then yes, I would be open to that cap, but with the understanding of, you need to think about things like I just said, Like, we can't have a cap on per pupil spending, but then announced tuitions could go up a lot more because that would kill a district like Randall Hancock. There's nothing they're gonna cut, right?

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Yeah, okay. Thanks. Okay. Good. Thank you very much.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: The evidence by this works.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Lane, I

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: want to Yes.

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: You. You for having me.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: The

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: testimony that I'm gonna provide today isn't intended to shed any kind of light on my feelings about Act seventy three one way or the other. It's really designed to answer the three questions that were posed to us as invitees here. In terms of supervisory unions and whether or not they should be preserved. So actually, you are and your superintendent? Superintendent, sorry about that. Two Rivers Supervisory Union. The two biggest towns are Ludlow and Chester, in area. And a lot of what I'm gonna talk about tonight actually comes from the discussions that I've had that have been ongoing with the community members that are in my towns within my district. The argument for maintaining supervisory unions is not based on their effectiveness as an organizational structure for managing districts. They are in fact quite inefficient given the need for a single central office to manage multiple school districts, each with their own goals, needs, resources, and governance models. This complexity makes it challenging to achieve streamlined, fragmented oversight, especially when compared to a single central office supervising a large unified school district. From my community discussions, much of the public's desire to retain supervisory unions stems from a wish to preserve their local voice within the new larger districts. Many community members equate supervisory unions in the preservation of their current local school board structure, believing it will ensure their needs are more likely to be heard and acted upon. This support is driven by concerns about losing local control and influence rather than any consideration of the pros and cons of the supervisory union model itself. Having served as a superintendent in Vermont in both a unified school district and a supervisory union, I have seen the differences firsthand. As a superintendent in Unified School District, I was responsible for multiple roles, including HR manager, curriculum director, and coordinator of federal programs. While not ideal, this was possible because the administrative structure was more streamlined. It was a lot of work, but it was doable under the unified structure and it allowed for consistency in policy and outcomes across all the district schools. In the supervisory union, my time is almost exclusively spent on meeting the disparate needs of several separate boards, functioning more as a consultant and an administrative assistant than as a district leader or an educational unit. The unified district model proved far more efficient, in my experience, better suited to the larger districts envisioned under Act 73. That said, community members' concerns about losing local voice should be addressed and could be better addressed by the inclusion of additional rules guiding the work of the voting board committee than by preserving the union school districts. In terms of the hybrid map, whether or not it meets the nuance for my area, it makes a fair amount of sense in terms of our district. It maintains an acceptable travel distance for our Career and Technical Center students. It keeps our current member towns in the same district, which supports consolidation by making collaboration easier because residents are already familiar with one another in terms of their needs and their motivations. In our district, Mount Holly is the only outlier. They face the same challenges after consolidation under this map as they do now. Half of their town is closer to what would be the new Rutland Otter Valley District than the Windsor District, which we would be a part of. Mount Holly, because of its sprawling nature, would be better served by school district boundaries that cut across the town instead of following the town lines. And this is an important recommendation which may ease the geographic burden some towns face. The negative impact of some of the imagined district boundaries may be eliminated if the new district lines cross towns instead of strictly following their borders. Lastly, I'm probably an outlier in this thinking, but to my mind, any thoughtful approach to the creation of district boundaries will serve the purpose of consolidation. What makes those districts successful in the end isn't where their borders lie. It's the decisions that are made and the structures that are built to support those districts once the maps are set. I would say stop worrying so much about the district boundaries. The thoughtful approach to their creation is already evident. Just make sure resources are available to build the support structures needed in each district that will allow them to be successful. In terms of whether the map should be accomplished this session, I tend to be kind of impatient when talking with my community members. I'm going to say that the answer is yes. We build budgets a year ahead of time. We need to know a full year in advance if we're going to accommodate major changes that either impact or will be driven by our budgets. The sooner we know the target, the sooner we can set financial machinery in motion needed to hit it, and that adjustment takes time. Lastly, there's a nuance that should be considered in change of this magnitude and the animosity it will evoke in the towns most affected by it. As you know, in Vermont, the education funding system is designed so that the total cost of education statewide is shared equally among all taxpayers. As a result, individual towns do not control their own local education tax rates. Instead, rates are determined by the combined spending decisions of all school districts across the state rather than by any one town alone. Because of this system, if individual towns run ahead, as some have done, and make major changes consolidating and closing schools while the other districts are not doing this at the same time, they will evoke the hostility that comes with those changes without providing any local tax relief and therein lies the great danger to the reform effort. The map needs to be set so that the timing of the major changes can be coordinated. If the consolidation of districts and schools is done piecemeal, individual towns will suffer through the changes and see no immediate financial benefit for doing so. And the backlash that ensues will be great. We all remember Act 46. If all the districts make those changes in tandem, the aggregate reduction in spending will lower the statewide tax rates providing the benefit to taxpayers. Not getting this timing right may well cause a backlash that will derail the work we're being asked to do. I would argue that the map needs to be in place and the timing of district and school consolidation must be coordinated so that taxpayers experience an actual benefit for what they are giving up at the time they are giving it up. Not getting this right will make conditions for those tasked with making those changes unaccountable, which is what the superintendent's

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: are constantly doing. I thank you, I don't know if this question is or So,

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: do supervisory unions all have one central office?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: That's the premise. The supervisory union, you have multiple districts, multiple school districts, multiple boards that are all overseen and served by central office. So in my case, Jamie does an amazing job. I apologize. An amazing job, but he has multiple school districts, school boards that he serves. It's one office doing it. In my case, I've only got two, but they are so different in their needs. Even their governance structure, one's policy governance one is not, that I really, as a central office and our staff, we're really doing the work of two completely separate central offices.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Have you talked to your districts about your desire to change inefficiencies and is there a path forward?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: So the ideal structure, at least from my perspective, is that instead of having, you know, Ludlow Mount Holly and Green Mountain school districts is to have TRSU, Two River Supervisory. One district, one model, one central office to cover it all so that everything is consistent. It is hard to make that sell because right now there is no tax benefit. There's no change for people giving up what they are used to to convert to that long. It would make things a lot easier for us to centralize.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: But not saying there's no savings in doing that.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: No. Okay. No, there

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: is not.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: And by the love cut baiter and I wasn't sure if you were saying that. No, he's wonderful. He would cut Mt. Holly in half or I'm just confused.

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: So under the hybrid map, you've got Mount Holly that sits over here. It is geographically spread out. Half of the district is more suited to going to Mill River, right? Just because of where the people live within their town. The other half is more suited to going to Ludlow where they're currently, the district they're currently a part of. So in their case, if you're drawing the boundaries based upon where the town boundaries are, they're on the Ludlow side of things, so half the people in the district are gonna have facing challenges just because of the distance.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So I like what you're hitting on is the really big tension point, having been here for Act 46, between us not knowing that and trying to accommodate the understanding of everybody's uniqueness and not doing it voluntarily.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Yeah.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: My What would you do if you were us?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: My concern is kind of what I've spoken a little bit about and it was learned the hard way during Act 46 in our town. They closed Black River High

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: School, right?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: They promised that there was going to be immense savings if we closed Black River. So they did that. They ended up tuitioning the students in grades seven to 12 out. Well, the tuition costs had grown by $800 per student per year. Last year, which is probably seven years since they closed Black River, it would have been cheaper to keep Black River open. So one of the things I think that happens in these districts, especially ours, is people have no faith that this is gonna change anything in terms of tax rates.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Do you think the kids are worse off?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: It's hard to tell. I'd have to go back and take a look at performance and achievement data. I don't think it's changed much. There's been a lot of educational change in terms of how we've been asked to do things over the years that I've been back in Vermont, but people don't go and look to see what impact it's had on achievement. Your achievement is down. So apparently all those things that we've been asked to do, even though they've been faithfully implemented, did not have the desired impact. That's

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: one of

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: the things that people need

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: to look at a little bit, but that's a separate conversation.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Yes, sir.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Terry Williams or Steven Heffernan)]: Yeah. So they closed Black River, and you said there wasn't a savings there. And you did the cost analysis each way if the school had stayed open if you don't think there would have been a raise in taxes? Because I had Hancock and Rochester had said that, and I said, well, do we know that's a true fact? Because the school's not open, you don't know if you would have had, you don't know if you would have had a a bit more asked, asked from the school to the taxpayer. So

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: I think it goes back to the education funding system itself, right? We don't have a lot of control locally over what happens to our tax rates as long as we're below the excess spending threshold because we all pay for each other. So we can literally make major cuts in our district, but if all the other districts around the state are increasing their spending, our tax rates are still gonna go up. And so with Black River, from what I can tell, they assumed that the impact of closing that school and the savings was going to be local. It's not. That savings was spread out across all the towns and taxpayers across the state, so it wasn't the magnitude that they thought. So it did provide savings for a few years, but we actually did the calculations, it was last budget season, and based upon those calculations and the cost to send those students out to be tuitioned out to the schools, it would have been cheaper to have Black River open right now. So it solved the problem for a few years. But in the end, because of the growth in terms of the cost from the education fund, We're back at where we started. It didn't solve the problems.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Terry Williams or Steven Heffernan)]: So it saved it locally, but being statewide, they didn't cut their spending and costs there. And

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: that's what I'm saying about this coordination. There's this idea that districts should be consolidating now. I can go and I can close three of my elementary schools and put them together as one and there's gonna be cost savings, but my local taxpayers are not gonna see it because it's spread out so thinly, it's spread out across all the taxpayers. And so what ends up happening is I put them through that misery. They see no change in their tax rates for going through that misery. And then the backlash that we're going to get for why did you do this to us, this system is not working, is gonna be immense. That's why I'm saying that the coordination of this has to happen at the same time. All districts have to make those cuts and those consolidations at the same time so that the misery that the people feel from losing what's happening locally is translated into something that they actually gain, is a decrease in their tax rates.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: And they would see that with the foundation as opposed to

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: the current system. Potentially, yeah.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Terry Williams or Steven Heffernan)]: I just like to clarify that that we in the committee are not talking about closing schools and doing the consolidation. It's just trying to create a more efficient system. And for some reason that gets echoed that we want to close your school, and until we get this all figured out, I wish people can go, hey, we want you to consolidate, which means we're gonna close your school.

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: I'm gonna argue that unless that sort of consolidation happens, will be no say against. I'm also going to argue that the enrollment requirements, if folks really wanted to save on taxes in Act 73, there are minimum enrollment requirements that are a part of it, right? Where classes have to be a certain size. That one piece of that entire gigantic bill would have solved the tax problems because it was going to force, if people actually live up to that, it was gonna force people to consolidate, close schools, cut staff. That's where the savings is. So I think from my own perspective, it's important to be honest that in the end for there to be savings, schools have to close staff after they lost. Do

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: the Black River students go to Green Mountain in the end?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: About 40% of them go to Green Mountain, another 40% of them go to the Mill River District. Again, because of that geography, there are some that go to Woodstock, there are some that go to a couple of the independent schools, know, Burr and Burrton.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: So from the Black River experience of these students that got distributed one way or the other, do they see a net academic benefit, like AP courses, anything that, because we're talking about the students, we have to kind of remove some of the conversation around everything's financial, because it's not, it's about the students.

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: I think having been doing some of the academic data, taking a look at it, not as much as would help answer your full question. I think it's more perceptual and I think it's more geographic. The choices are made a lot in terms of the geography, what's closest, what's more convenient for the families to be able to go out and attend the school events.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: So my question's a little different. Did Green Mountain or Mill River offer programs which were non existent in Black River, and that's one of the potential benefits

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: going of to the Green Mountain does. Green Mountain has a pretty robust AP program even though it's a small school and so you know with some of the discussion of the local districts, the districts that surrounds us because we have AP courses, they don't. There has been some school choice movement because of that. So we actually have students that are coming to Green Mountain just to take advantage of the additional AP courses that we offer that they can take in person if they can't get elsewhere. So I'm not sure

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: if I'm probably getting No, it's good. I apologize. I think Senator Weeks' question is essentially that if the school gets so small that it's time to close, probably by the time that happens, they're not offering a lot of things. Sure, the kid could get at, but with Stockfield or Green Mountain or else, think that was the thing. Coming

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: from Massachusetts with being a principal of high schools that are 1,600 kids or so, Our cost per student was probably in the $12,000 range and we offered programs and had services that you could not imagine just because of the economy of scale. So there is, from my perspective and from my experience, is the economy of scale argument is

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: a very good one. Okay, one question. Okay,

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: well one, there's been someone floating around and meeting an education policy leader nationally, just been floating around meeting with folks who whether or not he's the guy we we work with, I think we need to look at commute patterns and and mountains and geographies a lot more than any of the maps have. They are they're making rules about keeping current districts or not cutting out towns that that we're now hearing. They might not make sense. We should actually look at how people drive where they drive at Federer. Done that.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Setting up the map.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: There are people who who have a lot more detail on that kind of map. For do you am I hearing you echo what JD said that a foundation formula that is sufficient would be better than artificially drawn lines and then communities could draw those lines, or you still need some some requirement, some mandated merging of some kind?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: That question's got a bunch of problems and good ones too. I fall on the side of because we get there together or not at all, we've all got to be doing the same thing around the same times if there's going to be a benefit because of what we're doing, that there needs to be a mandate. Because the odds of getting the nine or excuse me, the 59 districts all doing the same thing at the same time so that people see an actual benefit to it if it is gonna be slim. We've got good people. In terms of the superintendents, I have never been anything but impressed since I came here from Massachusetts. They're all good people. But unless we're all doing the same thing at the same time, I don't think it's gonna work. The geography piece that you touched on as well, there's a little bit of a side, right, the mountain ranges in Vermont were north to south. Any kind of motion, you know, drive times that go east to west is gonna be a problem in the winter because you've to go over the mountains, over the valleys, up the mountains.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Did you say how many students were in your facility?

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: Overall, a little bit under a thousand. Thank

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: you, Victor. Thank you very much for coming. Thank you, Victor. I think Sherry Sousa is next. All Sherry.

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: Good afternoon and thank you and just take me a second. I have a slide deck that I'd share. I can't be there in person but I have some slides.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: If you heard just to reiterate your talk about some reaction to the.

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: All right. So Sherry

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: introduce yourself again for the record.

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: Yes. So I am Sherry Souza. I am the superintendent of Mountain View Supervisory Union which include the seven communities of Barnard, Bridgewater, Killington, Pittsfield, Pomfret, Reading, and Woodstock with just over 1,000 students. Should I go ahead? Yes. Yes. Okay. Thank you. So in my previous testimony to the Senate and the House Education Committee on January 13, I asked that the Vermont legislators reflect on these three questions in their work. Does our work create more equitable educational experiences? Is the work supported by evidence? And does it expand opportunities for and produce measurable positive impacts on student learning? And I would ask one more question in the consideration of redistricting Vermont public schools. Who are we serving by the creation of these maps? As I respond to the questions you've presented to me, I will keep these in the forefront of my testimony as I believe that they serve as a compass and the creation for a vision for public education. On January 15, in a presentation of the Education Agency of Education's proposed redistricting maps to the committee, Secretary Saunders offered her vision for redistricting. These maps based on VSBA regions and identified comprehensive high schools range in size from approximately 4,000 to 12,000 students. The justification for these new supervisory districts was that a kept together current SU's SD's contained at least one comprehensive high school and met the expectation of balancing property well. What I did not see in her testimony was how these new lines address equity of education experiences for students. By maintaining current SUs, SDs, the AOE is perpetuating the stated concerns, I. E. Limited educational opportunities and access to high quality education. Rather than addressing the root causes of poor student outcomes, we are instead reorganizing the existing structures into mega districts with the expectation that students will now do better and the state will save money. There is no evidence that supervisory unions districts at the scale proposed in this model will address these critical needs. These maps were created based on the premise that larger is better and not larger by merging SU's IDs with a shared educational purpose and established relationships, but larger to hit an arbitrary student population that is not based on evidence. I have the lived experience of creating a supervisory district from a supervisory union through a voluntary merger. Even when there exists a kinship between communities, the process feels like a loss for the families and citizens of these towns. Community members expect to have access to their superintendent when they have a question about the budget, a safety issue with the school, or why there was a snow. The direct connection between those served and individuals in charge of educating students would be lost if our SU's SD's grows grow to the size proposed by Secretary Sine. Equality as an as important as equally as important as reimagining the role and responsibilities of the central office in districts of 4,000 to 12,000 students is the stated intent of reducing educational costs. The secretary continues to sidestep the stated purpose of Act 73 to realize economic efficiencies. Whether we are addressing the needs of 2,000 or 11,936 students, responsibilities still exist in the adherence of state and federal policies, compliance with legislative mandates, commitments to in collective bargaining agreements, and the creation of a vibrant learning community. The names may change from those in charge from superintendents to assistant superintendents, directors of finance to assistant directors, or directors of human resources to human resource managers. But the tasks remain to address the needs of students as well as the faculty and staff. Again, there is limited evidence that supports the belief that a supervisory district or unit at the scale presented by the secretary would realize the stated fiscal reduction. So I return to my added question. Who does this map serve? Clearly not the students, as we haven't even set benchmarks to assess what we want from our schools. As the administration moves farther and farther away from the classroom, how do we expect superintendents to be the instructional leaders they need to be to truly serve the students in their community? How do superintendents not become so removed from the day to day challenges that they become middle management for the agency of education? During my January 13 testimony to the legislative education committees, I clearly and boldly stated my thoughts regarding supervisory unions as compared to supervisory districts. For me, supervisory unions serve the adults, supervisory districts serve students. I can make that statement because of my work to move a supervisory union to emerge district. Our seven communities made a brave decision to become a supervisory district. The merge allowed us to realize a unified contract, unified curriculum, unified strategic plan, Portrait of a Graduate and Educational Policies, Unified Instructional Practices, Unified Board that allows superintendents to serve as an instructional leader, Unified Budget that supports the stated purposes of these priorities of the strategic plan, and unified faculty and staff who are knowledgeable of the district policies. In my experience, the term unified is synonymous with the terms opportunity, efficiency, and effectiveness. This is not an easy process. Loss of board control was a primary concern for our eight boards and their citizens. These fears have not been realized due to the work of the Merge Board that resulted in impressive growth in student outcomes and improved faculty retention. This Merge did not close schools, but it did allow us to reimagine the instructional spaces that better reflected a portrait of a graduate. The 18 school board members now have a broader vision of the district and confidence in the capacity of the leadership team. Once we became a merged district, the schools and educators benefited from a clear coherent message of our purpose and a learning culture based on reflective practices. None of this could have really happened as a supervisory union with eight separate districts and boards. Only as a supervisory district could all of our students achieve this level of success. Superintendents cannot act as instructional leaders when serving the demands of multiple boards. And reviewing Senator Beck's CTA map presented to you on January 20 and previously to the redistricting task force, I again reflect on the question of who this map is serving. Does it maintain preexisting small supervisory unions so they continue to operate to serve the adults and not the students? I affirm that CTEs hold a significant role in the education of a portion of our student population, but they are not the majority of our students who choose other learning opportunities. This map represents the same character flaws as that presented by the secretary. There is no presented evidence that addresses the core tenets of Act 73, improving the equity of educational experiences and realizing cost efficiencies. Where are the expanded opportunities? How do these mega districts emphasize existing regional relationships? What are the cost efficiencies? Creating new districts goes beyond drawing lines through a map in support of an individual bias. Our communities, families, and students are asking for change, but not at the expense of quality of learning in Vermont. I value and appreciate your last question that demonstrates to me the commitment of this committee to make decisions informed by those closest to the issue and based on reliable data. I defer to the redistricting task force legislative report that best represents my beliefs on redistricting. They noted these key values that they made their recommendations. They are the need for stronger regional cooperation, Reliance on evidence and data for equitable access to high quality education, meaningful attention to voices, and solutions that reflect the unique challenges and strengths of Vermont's rural geography. With these guideposts, I believe that maps can be drawn that address Vermont's expectations and offer a strong vision for public education. Mountain View Supervisory Union or District demonstrated their commitment to forming strong regional relationships through its membership to the Vermont Learning Collaborative and by engaging in discussions with Windsor Southeast Supervisory Union and Hartford School District on collaboration. We have created a comprehensive high school for our seven district towns and 20 other communities whose children choose to attend Woodstock Union High School for their education. The opportunity to self determine our future is core to the respect of community voices, community voices, sorry. The progressive actions taken by MBSD serve not only our students, but those around us By leaning hard and improving student literacy, mathematics and social emotional outcomes, MBSD has stabilized student enrollment, both within our towns and also from our surrounding communities. By offering diverse student experiences, both academically and vocationally, our students and families see success in their futures. By establishing a culture based on mutual respect, an environment has been created where students and faculty want to come and learn and work every day. NBSD is privileged to have a thriving district, and we acknowledge the responsibility to ensure that students from other SUSD have the same experience. This is what a voluntary strategic merger looks like. The emphasis on educational benefit, community priorities, and fiscal sustainability. MBSD has been aggressive in establishing its vision for public education as it took advantage of the opportunities of Act 46. I concur that not all SU's SD's are ready for this kind of change. I would argue that our students wait, cannot wait any longer. Rather than attending to arbitrary deadlines of having new maps by the end of the legislative session, I would advocate and said that the legislation take the time necessary to create a path forward which would achieve the educational equity and economic efficiency proposed in Act 73. This framework could include a transparent process that requires clear data and authentic community involvement. Policies need to address the legitimate cost drivers of public education, healthcare, special education, and aging facilities. Mergers must be seen as an opportunity to achieve shared goals through phased transitions that are tied to local identities. Whether incentivized or mandated, combining smaller districts and unions to make intentional evidence based improvements will strengthen public education. Again, I appreciate the Senate Education Committee's eagerness to engage with those in the field to partner in the work of improvement, student outcomes and opportunities in Vermont. I ask that we continue to hold ourselves accountable to these focusing questions of intentionality and purpose as we move forward. Our goals are shared, our commitment is true, and the time is now. Thank you.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Sherri, I want to make sure I understand. It sounds like what you're saying is that the merger of districts should on the one hand be voluntary and done organically but are you also saying that there should be built into the system some deadlines for that happening or is that what you were saying?

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: So and again I met with the Southeast Superintendents today and we were universal in talking about the need for school districts. I appreciate my prior superintendent's testimony. Where are some of the opportunities that incentivize or provide guidelines, whether as Superintendent Polarity said that one superintendent or Supervisory Union District combines with another to reduce a path. There are opportunities for restructuring. How do we incentivize those? One of the conversations we had this morning is that we incentivize school districts and there's a minimum number of students within a school district. And looking at the data, there are some very small districts. Are those the ones that we focus in that transition, that's transparent process forward? Looking at those opportunities for the smallest districts, reimagining those size. My question and concern is districts of 4,000 to 10,000 students. I think that VSA as well as I would agree that once you exceed 2,000 students, the context of superintendent as an instructional leader, contact communities as both prior superintendents have spoken to is truly lost. And that's when superintendents become mid management and non instructional leaders.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Thank you. Yes.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I think what happens often in our committee is we force the conversation to sort of look district by district and pretty myopically at Vermont and talking to Mr. Millington and now hearing, Miss Sousa, which I've just really appreciated all your testimony and how well prepared it is. I just hope we are reminding ourselves that most school districts in the country are less than 2,500 kids. 70% of school districts in the country are less than 2,500 kids. The average is 5,000 kids per district. That is brought way up by districts of 50 to 100,000 kids in urban areas where there are clear efficiencies when you have 1,200 schools in New York City. I was just looking at Massachusetts, the average class size in Massachusetts is 17 and the average district size is two to 3,000. That's like a very good educational leader, right, Massachusetts. I I what I worry about is, like, this is losing context entirely. These maps are like, if if we could just agree maybe at some point next week to say to the administration or or whatever we agree on as a committee that we should not be talking about districts that are larger than 4,000 students whatsoever, and 2,000 is probably a good goal for any of it. And that would put us still within an average that, you know, doesn't even necessarily speak to the fact that we're the most rural state in the country. But I I I'm losing the ability to keep focusing on district size and mapping without us placing ourselves in a researched context.

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: Thank you for bringing that up. And as a previous Massachusetts teacher, so that's where my origins are in Massachusetts. And that's fine when you can be in one school to another within fifteen minutes. But even in my district of 1,000 students, I'm thirty minutes away from one of my elementary schools. And so how do my community members how do I make decisions on snow days? I mean, there are so many things that I have to make in context. So as someone who and my first school district was Tucson Unified School District, the largest school district in The United States. Very different when your schools are within walking distance of each other. But if we really, instructional leaders, knowing our communities well, knowing the culture and representation needs for our buildings, if we are going to improve student outcomes, that's critical. And thank you for bringing that up. I appreciate that.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Terry, thank you so much. I'm sure we'll hear from you again. Great testimony, thank you.

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: Thank you. Thank you all for bringing us in.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Do

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: you think this is the last stage we're going to be talking about large district maps? We're move on.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: We're not spending any discussion. Right.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Ready for me? Yes. Okay. All right. Good afternoon,

[Victor (Superintendent, Two Rivers Supervisory Union)]: senators. For the record,

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: my name is Ryan Herrity. I'm the superintendent of Memorial South, which includes towns of Elmore, Morristown, and Stowe. Today, I'm providing testimony on behalf of our two school districts to respectfully urge the legislature to focus less on forced redistricting and more on evidence based strategies that improve student outcomes, strengthen accountability, and stabilize property taxes. For background, the Memorial South Supervisory Union serves approximately 1,600 students across seven schools, including the Elmore School, the last one room schoolhouse in Vermont. Our Elmore, Morristown, and Stowe school districts spend significantly less than the statewide average while consistently performing above the state in all major academic areas and maintaining relatively low tax rates.

[Ryan Heraty (Superintendent, Lamoille South Supervisory Union)]: We maintain strong capital reserves, minimal debt, high teacher retention, above average teacher salaries, and facilities that have been maintained over time to minimize the need for significant new capital expenditures. This is made possible by sustained community support, active school boards, and intentional long term planning. For many years, our two school districts have worked collaboratively, sharing central office expenses such as special education, facilities, transportation, food service, business operations. Memorial South has been financially responsible and student driven, already capturing efficiencies of scale through voluntary collaboration rather than top down mandates. Our supervisory union is providing an excellent education at a reasonable cost to taxpayers, demonstrating that small and well governed systems can deliver both quality and efficiency. You have asked me to comment on the maps proposed by Secretary Saunders and Senator Beck. In each of the proposed maps, the L'Enoyle South Supervisory Union would be required to merge with the Lemoyle North and the Orleans Southwest Supervisory Unions to create a new district that covers more than 600 square miles and serves approximately 4,000 students.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I also read that the average size of a school district is two fifty square feet, and that's not taking account for five.

[Ryan Heraty (Superintendent, Lamoille South Supervisory Union)]: This proposal would collapse 12 school boards into one, radically shifting governance structure and local decision making, and it is difficult to see how such a dramatic restructuring would improve educational quality in our two districts or reduce costs for our taxpayers. The risks associated with large scale consolidation are substantial and, as I testified last spring, not supported by the most recent research. In particular, I would highlight five major concerns: Lack of community support trust. Families and community members have consistently opposed forced consolidation efforts, which are politically unpopular and risk map drawing that protects certain interests over others. Maine offers a recent example of a state that has reversed course on large scale consolidation after years of failed merger attempts and cost savings that never materialized. Also, there are increased long term costs that should be considered. Leveling employee contracts across a large regional district will significantly increase costs to the education fund and add long term liabilities to the pension system. Sorry, prior modeling indicates that in our Lemoyle County District, it would cost millions of dollars to level our contracts alone. Vermont's experience with statewide healthcare negotiations should be a careful lesson. Since 2018, our healthcare plans have gone from approximately $17,000 for a family to over $40,000 for a family plan. Also, beyond fair.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Yep, $40.17000

[Ryan Heraty (Superintendent, Lamoille South Supervisory Union)]: to over $40,000 for a family plan since 2018. There's also the unfair redistribution of debt and assets. Merging districts would require communities to share debt and assets across new geographic boundaries, resulting in taxpayers paying for bonds they did not approve and inheriting debts that would cut into local education spending and a foundation budget. Districts that have built capital reserves through careful planning risk losing those funds into a large regional pool, undermining incentives for responsible stewardship and worsening the challenge of maintaining Vermont's aging school buildings. There is also reduced oversight and weaker support. A district spanning more than 600 square miles presents serious challenges for adequate oversight, supervision, and principal support. To cover this scale, larger central office structures, assistant superintendents, additional directors would likely be needed, offsetting any theoretical savings and potentially distancing decision makers from the communities they serve. Also, probably the one I am most concerned about is a disruption to learning and stability. Major governance changes and leadership turnover are consistently linked to negative impacts on student achievement. During increased teacher turnover, shift in curricula, culture and climate disruption, and the loss of a clear strategic mission and vision. It often takes several years for a new leadership team to stabilize into these disruptions, years in which students only move through the system once. These risks are compounded by a sixth concern: a lack of state level capacity. A massive reorganization would create a multi year distraction for an agency that is already struggling to meet existing mandates, diverting time and attention away from literacy, mental health, and workforce development. In the Governor's address, Mississippi was cited as a model for reform. This state did not consolidate school districts. However, when reviewing their progress, they have made policy choices that combined accountability, investment, and instructional support. Specifically, Mississippi has increased accountability, holding districts responsible for student achievement and high quality instruction, including a promotion policy in which students who do not reach grade level proficiency are retained and receive targeted supports. Their data systems make spending and student achievement information readily accessible to the levelers. Mississippi increased overall education spending. They directed additional resources to the highest poverty districts to raise teacher salaries and provide research based professional development. Mississippi also implemented systemic literacy reform statewide for all kindergarten to third grade teachers, including letters training, a model now being replicated in Tennessee and other states that have seen similar improvements in reading outcomes. Vermont is unlikely to embrace mandatory retention based on standardized assessments, and there are good reasons for that. But there are clear lessons we can adapt: rigorous accountability, transparent data, strategic investment, and sustained support for high quality instruction, approaches currently used in many Vermont schools, including the model cell. With that context, I would offer these three areas for your consideration as you weigh how to use this legislative session. Regarding tax stability and targeted funding reform, Vermonters have asked for tax reform and stability. They have not asked for a wholesale restructuring of school governance. The tax revolt of twenty twenty four was closely aligned with the implementation of Act 127. Districts have now largely adjusted to this. Spending control can be accomplished through tools such as the excess spending threshold and more refined modeling of a foundation formula that uses current district structures supplemented by expert panels to account for Vermont's rural context and historical spending patterns. If the funding system is improved and expectations are clear, consolidation will be organic, locally supported, and data informed rather than mandated. Regarding accountability, transparency, and state level support, if Vermont is serious about improving academic achievement, the State must increase accountability, transparency, state level support. Taxpayers deserve accessible, understandable information on how their schools are performing. Every person that lives in Vermont should be able to know how the students in their local elementary school are performing on reading and math assessments. Currently, they cannot access that information. Regarding consolidation, I would urge that consolidation can make sense in many parts of the state, particularly when tied to modern, efficient school facilities that meet the needs of today's students. Targeted school construction incentives would lead many school districts to consider voluntary consolidation in ways that build on community support instead of undermining new people. The second home tax could be explored as a potential revenue source to support these strategic projects as Vermont responds to declining enrollment in an aging population. Vermont students deserve thoughtful, evidence based reform that strengthens educational quality, maintains local accountability, and respects the hard work communities have done to manage costs responsibly. There is significant opportunity cost and spending an entire legislative session debating maps that are politically unpopular and unlikely to deliver better outcomes for students. Thank you for your time, for your leadership, and for the opportunity to share this perspective on how Vermont can move forward with reforms that matter most in classrooms, not just on maps.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Thank you very much, folks. Very helpful. Thanks for coming.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: I have just a summary of the testimony. Do we have Oh, think we have it. Have You have it? Alright. This is your points.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Oh, yeah. I like both of them.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Alright. I agree. Good. Good for chocolate, it's gone. Okay, now, so yes, introduce yourselves and off we go.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: We're here from Vermont Scoopers Association. My name is Floridia Smith, I'm Bennington Stebbass. I am the President of Vermont Scoopers Association and I'm here with Nader Hashim, the Vice President of Vermont Scoopers Association. Thank you for the opportunity to provide our testimony today in response to the agency publication January 15 testimony on redistricting maps, particularly on the high risk scenario. We're not going to read the already have copies.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: I have just three of you. We have brought some extra copies of our criteria, but I think we already bad prints. If we're not going to read the criteria, we're going to split up our criteria and talk a little bit more into each of the pieces of the criteria and see how we examine the model presented. So, we use this criteria that you see here, those 12 steps to evaluate this. Okay. You want us to take the color versions? That would be great. So we used that criteria in order for us to really evaluate the plan, in this case, was presented to you in general. So we're gonna move to criteria one, which was the vision and mission alignment, and we think that a successful statewide plan must be based on a unified vision and mission for the Vermont Health Patient System, pre K-twelve, which I think we have heard today. The vision and mission should be the starting point and not an afterthought. The hybrid scenario blends the VSBA region scenario with the regional high school scenario. The VSBA regions were developed for a non profit membership association, governance and organizational purposes, not as an education governance. So each VSPNB generates two representatives, we vote for different regions here, to serve as VSPNB Board of Directors for alternating two years. These regional representatives will succeed one regional, sorry, at least one regional meeting per year, and in addition to that, they serve on our board of directors and we meet mostly monthly. It is unclear how the hybrid model articulates a clear and understandable unified vision and mission for the entire state, so pre K to 12 education. So, it didn't meet that criteria. Evidence of improved outcomes, so I'm moving to criteria two. BNBA continued to search that any proposed scenario be grounded in clear and robust data, demonstrating how student outcomes will improve directly due to the new structure, not simply through assumptions of scale. The hybrid scenario does not include evidence linking governance configuration to measurable outcomes. I wanted to put an example. The maps that Secretary Saunders that were presented were developed as a conceptual model intended to align with the acts of an inquiry for others, including a proposed 4,000 to 8,000 student enrollment target. However, the SBA believes that this enrollment range is not clearly grounded in research, like we were just talking about or we were hearing. Or we others. Yeah, and raises concerns about the ability to learn on educational landscape. Research and practitioner experiences indicates that while consolidation of a very small district can yield efficiencies, districts have become too large of an experience and administrative complexities, higher operational costs, reduced responsiveness to local communities on student needs and opportunities. I also wanted to point out that the absence of that CLARE Research Foundation and they continue to use that 4,000, 8,000, or 10,000 target has also the truth of stakeholder uncertainty and distrust of what is happening. Then I'm going to move to three, equity and educational opportunity. A central tenet of our criteria is ensuring equitable access to opportunities for all students. It is essential that any scenario you demonstrate how students across the state will have equitable access to academic programs and enrichment activities and career and technical education. The hybrid model does not address this criteria, has end the currents of barriers. So again, I wanted to put it in context and something that you're familiar with. So Vermont law, 16 BSA, and A1, makes an important point: Providing equal education opportunity does not mean every school must suffer the same programs. One of the strengths of Vermont Educational System is the diversity and the ability of local school districts to design programs that meet local needs. State policy recognizes that educational opportunities should be sustainably equal, even if programs differ from district to district. So, me put an example of something that you actually were talking about today. What is not clear is how the legislature and the administration is measuring that difference between equal and equitable educational opportunities. For example, some schools may offer advanced placement courses, but they may have very strong participation, some of them may have strong participation, dual enrollment, or early career at college grounds. How has the state evaluated the quality of an AP course compared to an actual college course. And why I bring this up is this, the AP cost is $98 per student. Most districts absorb that cost. But currently, the state, and this is from data from the state, currently the state invests more to 6,000,000 in early college and rural enrollment programs. These programs are not only as public school students, but also students in private schools or home study students. If the state plans to use specific measures, what they were talking about, hospitality, we ask that also review these existing state funded programs to manage by agency and dedication, and assess whether those investments align with the goals that they're proposing, so back to the vision of the mission. Can I pause you there? Where is that in your I wanna go her. Oh, okay. Not there, but I think Oh, okay. My notes. Okay. Because we didn't wanna make the testimony too big. I wanted to make it relatable, and that is If if I think You were mean, I know we're asking you to do Yeah. Think it's not your goal, but yeah. I think we need to look at that very carefully when students are being sent at much higher cost to a college because they have the privilege of being close to one and are stopping doing APs on campus for that reason. Yeah, and I don't wanna, you know, that is one of the great ideas. I hear That is one that is worth expanding. Unlike us to take care. Yeah, and then number four is shared responsibility and resources. VSBA supports a model that promotes shared responsibilities for students with full range of needs. It is unclear how the hybrid models promote such shared responsibility, and I'm gonna go into that one right now. One. Number five is the SBA. It is the equitable access to CTE and flexible pathways. So, SBA supports a model that prioritizes equitable access to both high quality career center and technical education and flexible pathways for all students, Equipping them with the knowledge and skills they need for successful careers of their choosing is unclear whether the regional high schools in the hybrid centers will be comprehensive. High schools offer equitable access to high quality career and dental education because it is missing that information. So, many other details in the hybrid scenario do not create those conditions that we're trying to accomplish, especially in this particular criteria. I'm trying to move to sixth facility. Think what I would say to that one is that we need to think about access to opportunity differently, not just as a matter of quantity, right? There also has to be quality. So, number six is facility investment and long term sustainability. The hybrid scenario should include analysis of facility needs and how districts would clean the configurations and responsibly finance, maintenance, renovations, construction without clear parameters for facility funding that ensures equity across community risk criteria events. Of us, like a mile district, we're dealing with PCBs, regardless of where that conversation goes, we're having to deal with it. That's the only example I'm gonna ask. That's Megan. Yeah, so criteria seven is efficiency and cost effectiveness. One of the basic standards that we look at, and I hear that from you as well, is will this save money? I think that it's unclear from the analysis how this would do that. If you're going to restructure districts, you need credible, detailed analysis showing they'll actually save money or stabilize costs without cutting programs or raising the burden on taxpayers. And this hybrid scenario doesn't meet that standard. I know that you are not responsible for healthcare, but healthcare is an excellent example of where that comes into play. It's one of the largest cost drivers in education. In the district where I'm the chair, our healthcare budget is 16% of our overall budget, and that has gone up 48% in seven years. I come from a large district at $17,000,000 Statewide, healthcare is on pace to consume about 20% of school budgets within the next five years. Laura has an Op Ed and VT Digger today that you can read that will give you more information about that. So if we adopt CAPS for spending or foundation formulas that don't address or account for those realities, districts won't magically become more efficient. They'll cut programs. That's what will have to happen. The criteria is efficiency in community. And we do need to talk about scale. I very much appreciate what you said, Kesha, about really size overall. Research cited by the Vermont Superintendent Association suggests districts of about 2,000 to 4,000 students structure the right balance. They're large enough to be efficient and small enough to maintain community and personal connection. We've heard a lot about community and personal connections today. We agree with that in principle, but we also recognize that rural parts of the state may need to be below that 2,000 number in order to, because of geography. I come from a district of almost 4,000 students, and I believe that scale matters, but you don't need to be at the high end of the range. You need something that works for your community. And to some of the points of other superintendents, it needs to be able to practically implement, because we not have the capacity to implement these changes in a way that does not disrupt education. Under the hybrid scenario, the average district would have over 6,400 students and the largest would have over 9,000, and that's well beyond what research reports, and it's too large to maintain the kind of community connection that our families and students value. Variation across regions. You also heard today, Vermont is not one uniform place. Student demographics, community resources, and geography vary very widely from region to region. So it makes sense in Chittenden County does not make sense in the Northeast Kingdom or the Southern part of the state. The one size fits all approach does not work in a classroom, and it won't work in statewide district design either. The hybrid scenarios not account for these differences. Another really important thing that we think about is collaborative decision making. Plans like this only work when a process is collaborative, transparent, and inclusive. When families, educators, district leaders, and school boards are genuinely involved. Redistricting task force and the Commission on the Future of Public Education made real efforts to do that, but this hybrid scenario does not. It was developed without meaningful engagement with people who actually have to implement it and live with it. So that does not meet our criteria. Transparency in data is probably one of the most important points to me, is that the hybrid scenario does not include basic necessary data. Projected financial impacts, effects on students, transportation, staffing, or communities. I know one of the private superintendents talked about the cost of leveling up for contracts in the district. That's a significant cost that needs to be considered, especially if the purpose of this is to save, is to curb costs. Need real data to understand the real consequence of what you're considering. And then finally, there is the question of implementation. There's nothing in this plan that addresses implementation. And moving from 119 districts to 13 without a detailed transition plan, realistic timelines, funding and support is not feasible. These are just maps. My own district consigning ten years ago, and yes, I also listened to testimony from Burke Olson Farrell in Slate Valley. Transitions take time, a lot more time than legislation currently deserves. Without a serious transition plan, this proposal sets districts and students up from unnecessary disruption, which will harm outcomes. In closing, what we want to say is that AOE hybrid scenario does not meet the ESBA criteria for responsible implementation. That's what I'm reading. While we acknowledge that it would be difficult for any in return scenario to meet all of our criteria, it should at least create the conditions for meeting each criteria. The hybrid scenario, just as Megan was saying, the 13 districts within a minimum size of 5,000, average district size to 6,413, and a maximum district size of 9,142 are too large to maintain strong sense of community within each district and will represent a drastic change from Vermont's current number of 156 districts. So, VSBA continues to support our redistricting task force proposal because it creates the conditions for meeting the criteria. A logical next step would be for the legislature to build upon the work of the task force by defining the proposal and filling in the details. And I know that that's not what you want to hear, but too often reports are produced.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Actually, would say I don't think you have any idea what we want to hear. We just want to hear.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: Too often reports are just produced and only set on the shelf. To avoid that outcome, the legislative needs to pair this work with clear incentive, pair that work of the force, the revision task force, with clear incentives, appropriate pacing, and where necessary accountability, I know that's politics, the most respectful person to pick up the work that has already been done. Start there and build on the pieces that are ready to move forward. That approach honors the effort invested, maintains momentum and increases the light of both a meaningful and lasting change. And we were just talking about that. When are we going to stop talking about math? We're revisiting what happened before instead of moving forward. Public education is more than a delivery system of core services. It's one of the most enduring democratic institutions we have. And we're reminded about that, especially right now in the context of Addison. Our school districts are where communities learn to govern themselves, where families feel known, and where children experience what it means to belong to something larger than themselves. And any redistricting proposal must be judged not only by the efficiencies or scale or the criteria that I just read, but whether it preserves its essential democratic functions and creates the conditions for high quality education to endure. And then, I just want to say, SBA stands ready to work collaboratively with the legislature to advance education reform that supports students, respects the communities, and sustains taxpayers. We ask the committee to embrace thoughtful evidence based change and to ensure that our local school boards have a meaningful voice in shaping the future of public education. You for listening to us. You have any questions?

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Yes. Actually, I do. So so with the school boards, you guys are very much the core of community. You know, we've heard it, heard it a 100 times. So the question to you is, is is the identity of a community more aligned with the school or the administrative, educational administrative unit that you're associated with?

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: I would say, I'll let Megan jump in too. I would seen myself from Washington Central area, we're trying to vote right now in closing, this year, closing, central closing to a personal town, right? Some people feel that identity is very much in that schoolhouse or the building itself. Some people in the community feel that it's the kids in that town, the traditions that they have been doing. Some feel that we were one of the districts that were forced consolidation, right, that it took a few years for us to see ourselves as a system, as a whole, and really understand is all our kids. So, to go back to your question, I think that governance is important in whatever a form is developed. We need to make sure that if it's a really small town that chooses by any chance to close their small school, that if there's a bigger board that's gonna be part of that district, that they have a voice in whatever that new governance is. But I think we, you as legislators and ourselves as board members, we need to be with what is best for kids, right, and what is best to be able to sustain a public education that is meaningful and that is best quality, best outcomes for all our kids in the state, right? So, I don't think we need to concentrate just in buildings or we need to make sure that we do what is best for our communities as a whole, other than the boys are not able completely answer your question. It's complex, it's complicated, but you don't have the ability to get involved. There's too much at stake, I think you have a good foundation, and we need to move together. This is where we are, and let's move forward together, and listen to the people that are boots on the ground. Would be the ones implementing, and if you have a really large district, can implement 173, can, and there's some, I don't know, we can come back with other things. Think we have been trying to talk across our associations between Vermont School of Socialization, NDA, the PSA, NVPA, how we come together to you and present something that we can, we shouldn't be in charge of creating the solution, but we can make sure that we're informing the path forward. Yes. Well, I think you, I just want to underscore something you said that could get lost, not sharing information that's actually based in evidence and research can cause a lot of mistrust and a lot of confusion, just confusion. And I I will say for myself, I feel that from the agency of education coming in and saying some things evidence based or evident in the research and not citing it, not getting on the same page with people that there's agreement about the methodology and where figures came from. I think we need to look into that more if we're gonna have AOE back in. I don't think we need to, but I asked the auditor's office to help me figure out how much they have paid just to APA Consulting over the last three years, and it's a total of $823 $823,000 of $450. I think we need to figure out what that was spent on because we have a lot of people who've come before us with incredible presentations based in the research, well cited, who have not spent $823,000 on their work, and to my knowledge, we have not taken up a majority of AOE proposals, if any, and yet they have no accountability for how much money they're spending on things that are not well cited and not well researched.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Any other questions? So do you have any, like, if we're trying to move forward now and do something I think the thing that I think we have to no matter what given where taxpayers are is do something to get a handle on water so in some way control the rate of increase and spending and sort of asking this question of witnesses as they come through. Do have any suggestions for us about how we quite interested in that?

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: I would say address the cost drivers. Address the cost drivers, that would be the fastest way to get us to save actual money and then not put the school boards and superintendents to fail, right? Because reconsolidation is not going to save you any money.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: I know you actually have a suggestion with regard to healthcare.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: We do.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: And I think it's going to be taken up in closing that out deal.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: Yeah. It's in the House right now.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: It's in the House? Okay.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: It could go to a lot of different committees in the Senate, but I don't think anyone's sponsored that language.

[Sherry Sousa (Superintendent, Mountain Views Supervisory Union)]: Think Sandy? Yep.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: Sandy, that's what Sandy is saying. Oh, so in the house, everything Yeah, the house. There's a lot of people. I guess that's why. Yeah, Virginia, the house is leaning into the bill.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Where did it get assigned? To which committee did it get assigned?

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: It hasn't been introduced yet. I think it will be introduced next week. So

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: as the conversation matures about the impact of healthcare costs and education costs, think it would be appropriate to have the chairs of one or both of those committees come in and provide testimony on the record for what is being done to address that. Otherwise, the onus remains on us.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: So I well, I will say, I mean, I said there's a number of committees that can go to because the proposal, I believe, is about labor negotiations. It's what can be bargained individually versus as a package in a labor negotiation, which would traditionally go to the economic development committees. It would, I don't, I didn't know it had been introduced singularly in.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: So this was a conversation last year rather it got.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: But we asked Ginny to come in and that's not really her, she's lowered the cost of healthcare.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Someone's gotta put their hand up.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Yeah.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Say, I'm addressing that issue. Otherwise, we we're a terrific.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: You're in economic development. It's a labor negotiation issue. We have labor. Good. Okay.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Okay. So.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: I cannot answer.

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Yeah, all I'm saying is the cost of healthcare is not in this committee, but it's affecting this committee in a dramatic way. Whoever in this building is responsible, who does put up their hand and say this is within their scope, is coming here and talk, so that all the people out there who are dealing with the education in question.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: I would say propose it in economic development.

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: Because it's My trying recommendation to the chair He's

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: making a somewhat different point, I think, as well.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: I don't understand it. You want Allison to come in here?

[David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: I think Allison may have a piece of it. Senator Clarkson may have a piece of it. Senator Lyons may have a piece of it, the chairs in the House may have a piece of it. I think that conversation is beyond the scope of the committee, but it's affecting everything we're talking about, and that it needs visibility when we're addressing IAC seventy three and every other effort for education transition.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: Beehive was education gov ops

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: and appropriations. That's what I'm gonna pull you

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: up on.

[Flor Diaz Smith (President, Vermont School Boards Association)]: I know. Can I just say one last thing? I heard something that was commented today, two different questions that were asked, doing that, and again, S-twenty pulls attention away from the core reform that was envisioned by absolute truth. There is a real risk that a short term policy response will undermine the long term profitability and equity. And again, you're moving away from that work that you need to be doing right now is another destruction of the work, Just because it was commented here by testimony today, don't know if sure. Yeah, I think to that point, with SD20, cap on that is on per people spending, actually on per weighted people spending. And as school board members who manage budgets, I guess we oversee, we oversee, we oversee and approve the budget, we don't manage it. It's very difficult to manage to per people's spending and to oversee that cost per people's spending perspective. Much because those weights can change so much and it's weighted per people's spending rather than actual students, you know, actual People. People. People spending. So if you think about, like, it's when we when we we oversee budgets, we're looking at net ed spending and the growth of that. It's much easier to manage that process overall. So, for example, last year, our budget, our net ed spending budget increased by point 9%, but per people spending increased by 3.3%. Whereas, this year, our net spending budget is up by proposed as 5%, and that's a per people spending increase of 2.7%. So, it's not a That's just a part of the process that would make it very difficult to think about as you manage.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: So I just would, I think the dilemma this committee is facing and the whole weather switcher is facing is that we've been able to buy down the rate for the last few years. It looks like we are likely to get that to some extent again this year but I predict that will not happen again. Thanks. And that each year we buy down the rate as we all know it makes it worse the next year. So we're facing a major split in terms of immediate split. So one of the things we have to be thinking about as a body is what could we do immediately to not find ourselves in a situation where budgets are getting cut by voters and masks because and that's, you know, I think that's upon us almost. Or do we do something orderly very quickly at the same time as we're looking at? So that was kind of the core of my question because I think we need to be thinking both ways and I've been asking people who come in front of us for thoughts about that first part as well as the long term. So, and like saying, biggest healthcare isn't gonna do it in the short month. Although, I agree with Senator Rutland, we have done a lot to cut down the rate of increase in healthcare in the last couple of years in particular. Think that, I actually give the Senator one a quote for that. Think

[Jamie Kinnarney (Superintendent, White River Valley Supervisory Union)]: But,

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: so I would just ask you to consider that because I think we have to be thinking both ways. Yes.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So, Mr. Chair, you've said this a few times in it. It's kind of occurring to me after today's testimony, many people said there's a there's an inherent contradiction between a a flat cap or one that is incongruent with the valuation budget and the foundation formula moving forward. And at some point, if we move forward with the foundation formula, we do not vote on local budget. So That's right. I think we like, I don't know which future or current state we wanna talk about, but we should be setting a date and thinking about it where it is not a vote if we are going to follow through with the foundation.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Yeah. Foundation pilot was came in came into effect with the current version.

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Was, like, over eight years, and the cap just kind of waylays that.

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: But it does start

[Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: It starts in 2027, would you think?

[Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: We should take a quick quick break. Grace is here. Grace, you don't have to come on yet, but we'll take a quick break and then So for you. Go here today. Last thing is that just so people understand this is is by Grace Miller, and we You all may remember the stories in Digger at Seven Days a couple of years ago about the student doing their thesis on effective virtual and a lot. It's a better way to say it's been an hour Okay.