Recap of last night (Nov. 13) in-person meeting at Churchill for academic program & boundary analysis

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11/14/2025 12:31

Subject: Recap of last night (Nov. 13) in-person meeting at Churchill for academic program & boundary analysis

quote

Anonymous

I hope this thread can collect ppl's feeling/feedback from last night's in-person meeting as well as new information. I'll share first my experience:

1. Central office sent like 50 employees, so people can't gather in large groups or voice out loudly. Essie and Nikki were both in the feedback room, but they didn't host a gathered session but rather only allow individual discussion. Jennie was in the cafeteria presenting the regional model, which consistently gathered good size of audience (~ 30 or more). It's like a conference poster session setting.

2. They will present a "version 3" regional model in Nov. 20 BOE meeting, where some details will be modified.

3. A NEC/DCC transportation POC was there, and said they would use the NEC/DCC transportation model rather than the HS-HS model so to make sure visiting neighborhoods. I've checked the 2016 METIS report and estimated the 2025 dollar-equivalent: it's about 1.6 million/year operating cost for DCC. As a contrast, the Oct. 16 BOE meeting slides had $740K/year operating cost estimation. So expecting the yearly operating cost to double at least.

4. Nikki and Jennie gave very different answers to questions. They appeared thinking right on spot of whatever answer they can think of. For example, I asked if a program is later evaluated not sustainable (e.g., low enrollment, can't acquire teachers, poor score metrics, etc.), will this program get cancelled across-board. Nikki said they would put more money into that program until it's successful, and no program would fail. Jennie gave a much more realistic reply, although still quite funny. They would maintain the same "theme" but change the program to another "sub-theme" to see if it would work. She gave an example that they could change "fashion design" to "game design", as if they would require the same set of expertise from teachers.

5. STEM program POC said she hadn't contacted SMCS coordinators nor teachers for curriculum design. She "will do" once the regional model gets approved. So current 7th grader need to make a decision based on a program without curriculum or teaching staffs. Jennie said the STEM program will have the 8th period to accommodate the additional CS courses.

6. I've told two staffs that my questions/feedback using the online google form never got addressed in Q&A doc or BOE meeting. They told me to "keep on submitting another form".

7. Jennie said the criteria-based programs won't use lottery. She might consider use local-norm of MAP-M and other metric scores if waitlist is too long for one region over another.

My gut feeling: Jennie is the one leading the design of details. If you have any detailed suggestion/tweak that you think might be very useful, contact her directly. Nikki and Essie know absolutely no detail and no interest to know at all. So they say nonsense. This entire regional model is an absolute "top-down" thing and they have absolutely no interest of compromising a little bit (e.g., slow down, scale back, use community feedback). The current 7th grader will be the unfortunate guinea pig.