Stoughton School Committee adopts seven policy revisions, including domestic violence leave and personnel technology use

The Stoughton School Committee voted unanimously Dec. 17 to adopt a set of policy changes and two new policies recommended by the policy review working group.

In two motions moved by Lindsay and seconded by Armando, the committee adopted revisions to policies DJA, DJE, ECA, EHAA and EHB, and separately adopted GBEE (personnel use of technology) and GBGE (domestic violence leave). Both motions carried by voice vote, recorded as 5–0.

Committee members said the policies will be reformatted and cleaned prior to final submission to the Massachusetts Association of School Committees (MASC). Committee staff committed to remove markup, highlights and draft watermarks, insert adopted/revised dates for each policy, and distribute clean copies to committee members. Karen and other members asked that the school committee receive finalized hard copies for their policy binders once MASC posts the updates.

Members also clarified that GBGE is a newly adopted policy providing domestic-violence-related leave options for employees, while several other changes were edits or clarifications to existing policies. The policy working group advised that policies that do not spark committee controversy may be adopted at the discussion meeting when changes are minor.

During review of the policy packet, members raised several minor edits to minute wording, scholarship descriptions, and requested insertion of an ADA report reference under the superintendent update (see related meeting notes). The committee agreed to adopt the policies on Dec. 17 and to circulate cleaned, final versions afterwards.