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3 2 1 Welcome to Ash 2024 good morning and welcome to around the clock's coverage of Ashland day 2024 I'm your host Yanda Greaves we're going to take you through this day it's a little rainy but we're expecting people to turn up and show up because it's been a few years since we've been able to gather here with the Ashen community and celebrate all the great things that is the community of Ashland so hope you enjoy our coverage of Ashland day we might get a little wet but we're hoping for some sun a little bit later on if not Sun maybe no rain so we'll share the things the events that happen at the Gazebo as well as take you through and speak with some of the vendors and groups that are here in support and celebration of Ashlin day hello we are continuing our Ashland day fun I guess uh we're going to be talking with different people right now we have Makita Keegan and her son Alex Makita your first Ashlin day as a select board member does it feel any different um it doesn't feel different but it always feels good Yolanda and we're happy to be here so Alex do you remember ever coming to Ashlin day um I only remember one time but I don't exactly remember the date so what are you most looking forward to here at Ashland day other than the ice pop that you're enjoying so much hang out with my friends and if the rain clears up uh going out onto the going out onto the bouny houses on the rides what which one are you most looking forward to the bouncy castle uh Makita it's a little bit rainy but what what advice do you have for people who are attending today listen you know Yolanda you know and everybody else knows that a little rain ain't going to get get Ashlin down we are here to have a good time to celebrate Community rain or shine so I'd say come on down have fun we've got a lot of vendors here got a lot of community groups here um it's a great way to start a rainy Saturday so don't hesitate just come on down say hi there you go come on down to ashin day and enjoy the fun hello we're now talking with Jen arah Jen nice to see you nice to see you Ashlin day what brings you back um memories as a kid coming here so I brought my kids that are over at the bouncy houses right now but just the enjoy the community and being together do you still live here in town I do what kept you here uh the location and the people the community nice nice what were you looking forward to most here at Ashland day uh nicer weather um but just seeing um and seeing old friends and old communities small businesses and supporting [Music] everybody started to take it down wind trowing away mon [Music] [Laughter] it's the best cheeseburger at Ashland day there you go so again welcome again yet we're back we had a 4-year Hiatus unfortunately 3 years with Co and a tropical storm that hit us last year as we were doing an interview here and uh here you gok you here you [Music] go we the Twilight stries and star through the bar for the we soing and The Rock thir Pro through the night that our was still there oh say do [Music] our of the and the [Music] of we are now speaking with members of the Ashlin National Honor Society ladies if you could give me your Nam I'm Bren I'm Alan and what year are you ladies we're the class of 2025 okay and tell us a little bit about why you're here at Ashland day and what some of the events are that you have coming up so we have some Flags here at Ashland day so you can honor a veteran and the flags are personalized with the veterans name whether they're alive or deceased and their branch in the military and then we're also selling lollipops and bracelet kits and what do you have coming up in the spring um in the spring we have the talent show coming up and then in October we're also going to be at the farmers market selling all these great things great so farmers market on October 19th and Flags uh for veterans coming up as well ladies thanks for chatting with us and have a great day here at Ashen day thank you great pleasure to acknowledge thank and uh award Rob St gerain a senate citation uh in honor of receiving the 20 24 ashin citizen of the Year award for your outstanding service impact and leadership in the community and I I'll spare you the rest it's this will be in the Senate notes um I do just want to mention that that uh Rob we have been blessed with Rob's presence and living in ashin since 2001 uh he moved here he was a Management Consultant before all of his volunteering work and Ashland provided A Feast for him for volunteering um you said at one point in time and I did look into this that after you retired working for the town was cheaper than therapy and many of us can relate to that many of us can relate to that it keeps you busy he has done so much to strengthen the fabric of Ashland's life uh we are the big beneficiaries of it uh he's worked with the scouts he's volunteered with the open space committee he's helped with the beautiful River Walk The Town Forest uh as the chair for many years um he lives nearby and uh it's I understand it that he walks all of the trail Trails pretty much every week uh to make sure they're clear for the residents of Ashland and others and uh that everything is in top shape so you know for somebody who has volunteered and done so much to strengthen the town of Ashland we thank you we acknowledge you and uh we just say please keep all of your volunteering or pick some new things now that you might be moving on thank you so much and here's the Senate citation actually you want to face that way congratulations that I was actually doing a project for the for the select board and I was selecting different groups different committees and oh yeah he just realized he get he got zapped there he goes was more than just a person that loved the Town Forest he loves life he loves the community he loves the things that he does emphatically without reservation with he told me was in a recap as a uh an asand participant and a volunteer you don't often reflect on the things that you do in your life until someone asks you about it and in the last 24 years they've been they've been together they've lived in Ashland and he's done a wonderful thing he's enjoying life for the first time in quite some time he enjoys the forest he takes care of everything and he's when I asked him about his children he said he has five total children three his own and two two of Brits and four natural grandchildren uh he started working on the proposed Riverwalk project many years ago and he even helped with Community preservation committee his leadership has led to him being appointed to open space space in Recreation over the years and he chose to work with the Sudbury Valley trustees land trust and town of Ashland uh leading Rob to become a property Steward and work to remove invasive plants as has already been said but Rob was recognized for his substantial efforts by being awarded the Sudbury Valley trustees Steward of the land award and we all know how much he loves the Town Forest that is a very appropriate designation where so now therefore we the select board do hereby Proclaim Saturday September 1st so today as Rob St Germaine day and we urge all residents to make known their appreciation for his Devotion to the town of Ashland and we wish you good health and good fortune congratulations and now you get to talk we know you canland citizen of the year uh and so I have a house citation uh signed by myself uh and the speaker of the house uh from all of my colleagues uh to congratulate you thank you we'll get a picture as [Applause] well I think it's been a long long uh negative hall for miss Karen spilka now Senator president Karen spilka we are very honored to have you here and to have you live in town and have you help us throughout the years and getting funding for the many different projects that we that we uh have in town now uh you fighting for us and advocating for small towns against big cities and larger towns than Ashland for an equal funding formula for education uh which I know was something that you were champion of for for many many years and we greatly appreciate you doing that so a real quick history about Karen and Joel and Scott and Jake Karen Karen's career began in public service the fight which he realized was the inequity of the Educational Funding which I just said and uh while her two sons attended Ashland Public Schools in the early '90s she realized that the Commonwealth formula was not accurate was not right and it needed to be overhauled and there were many others who felt the same way and as I look out and I see the crowd in front of me I see that uh Claudia Bennett was another uh proponent for that and thank you as well and uh there others so thank you on your behalf for us um Karen's fright for equity and education and Fring resulted in the first major accom accomplishment as Senate President the passage of the student opportunity act the culmination of her 20 years the S SOA combined the largest increase in Educational Funding in Massachusetts history would change the public K to2 students to the student opportunity plan encompassing Early Education care and public higher education most recently state budget being signed into law this plan now is a reality including a $ 1.5 billion investment in Early Education and Universal free Community College a lifelong mental health Advocate Karen led the senate in the passage of an National leading mental health reform ensuring that people got the mental health care that they so desperately needed and they needed in 2022 the bill is now law and thank you for that Karen and the list of accomplishments go on and on and on but we all know what she has done we all appre appreciate what you have done for us and for many others in and around the Metro West area uh one last uh one that she was a sponsor and passed two major bills which the gender X and the Jenny's law as a direct result of conversations with con constituents and she spearheaded the creation of the Metro West tourism and visitors bureau one of the many efforts to direct more resources and recognizing her District and we greatly appreciate that she is Fier in her actions she's also Fier with her family and with her friends Karen draws the strength and inspiration and wisdom from those experiences growing up in a family touched by mental health and disability and from her husband and two sons Scott and Jake and rescue dogs Lincoln and Massa I did I did say it right and I practiced all night long be be thankful uh Karen's previous roles as a social worker small business owner and attorney also informed her work today she's now proudly represents Metro West and communities of Metro West and North Fork district and comprised of Ashan Framingham Holliston hopkington Medway and nii as well as the entire Commonwealth of Massachusetts as the state senate State president she's a graduate of Northeastern University and holds a BS in social work and corner University and my first time that I met Karen was across the table in a labor law dispute and you were a mediator from the town of Ashland and the Ashland police Union and it was quickly resolved thanks to your efforts we greatly appreciate that so on behalf thank you on behalf of the ashon Day committee it is my honor and privilege to award you our grand Marshall for September 21st 2024 Senator president Karen [Applause] spila I'm not gonna well I was going to say I'm not going to speak for too long but that's what politicians usually start and then they go on and on and on so um I am going to try not to cry this really took me by surprise I can't believe my my team pulled this off and didn't say anything and I usually can figure things like this out but uh I I really am surprised um I just want to say uh thank you to Joe and the Ashland Day committee and Bill and all of the folks here for keeping this going I remember coming to the first ashin day um and coming to many others of beautiful sky of pouring rain um but this really helps to uh develop and build and showcase ashin pride and all that we do I am so happy that over 40 years ago we made Ashland our home um it's an amazing Community I'm proud to be a resident here at that point in time I never ever thought that I would be a legislator let alone a senator or a Senate President but you know Ashan afforded me opportunities to Advocate and fight for things in ways that I never thought of and yes I look out at Claudia I think of Harry henchy um also a partner in advocating for changing the education funding formula that was so unfair to Ashland and all of our metros communities um and so much more so I feel that I am really blessed to to be where I am uh and andan I just want to say uh this is an amazing honor and uh I I really thank you it really is a surprise thank you so much have a great day enjoy Ashland day I just have one question does every politician have to have a BS degree no I think so we have another young lady who would like to come up here for a minute her name is Sue thank you for calling me young okay I know this is kind of ridiculous you know what I'm going to do we always present a senate citation to the Grand Marshall of Ashlin day so we create a Sena citation recognizing you as the Grand Marshall and it's also signed by you as the Senate President I don't know if I need to read it right no no it's what's funny is when they announced we're going to have a Grand Marshall I turned to Susan and I said do we have a citation for the Grand Marshall you know who is it she said just wait wait you know wait minut a lot more rude than that I think I said give me two minutes congratulations your first cation thank you [Applause] everybody okay and and my story starts back in 1963 that it ashin was a little smaller town than it is now and 1963 was a big deal for the town of ashin it was also a big deal for the hempton family my daughter Lisa was born and she's over here to celebrate there an old story that it takes a village to make something happen and it took a village to make this happen in 1963 ashin as I said was a much smaller Community okay we did not have a prefix for our telephone we under to Framingham 617 I believe and so the uh Telephone Company decided they were going to build a brick building at Main and Union Street and that were going to give us our own prefix which was it is 881 and so it was and they also added a time capsule when they built the building to be opened in 50 years it is now 61 years and it hasn't been open so two years ago I met with cliff and I said Cliff what's going on with this are we ever going to open that capsule he said I know nothing about it so anyway fast forward without all of the BS and all of that stuff this Village made it happen thanks to this guy that uh does a lot of work for uh now it's Verizon but it was the telephone back then and and you needed I believe 2 million 4 million in Insurance to get into the building and because he is covered with the insurance he is the one who got us into the building once we get in he said now we need a Master Mason Master Mason was Paul kuchi who was not here today uh Paul said I told him what we wanted we we did a meeting down there Paul said wait a minute how much is this going to cost me I said nothing you're doing it for free so without further Ado if if anybody if you two guys want to get your two cents worth in feel free I'm going to take my shears and open the copper box and have these guys pull pull whatever is in there out and see if we can explain what it is what more Dad hi one more all right a handb I think sorry sorry hi there don't cut your fingers honey watch out watch out is that I know it is paperwork y i you getting it'll donate it to the town right absolutely absolutely we can do that all right Yolanda yes you are the chairman yes the last person that touched this was the chairman of the board of selectman okay that put the first thing in so come over here and take something out and identify it to the people and we'll see what it is I have no idea okay this is perfect so the first thing I pulled out was the action by the annual town meeting for March 4th 1964 ashin Massachusetts these are the notes I won't read all of it a quorum being present the meeting was called to order at the high school auditorium at 7:35 p.m.

[Music] hello clockers welcome to another segment of waca news blog my name is hi silver and today I will be giving you a brief summary of the ashin Town manager's newsletter Ashlin is born in the loss of Roy Korea deputy director of operations for the ashin DPW Roy was known for his humor kind heart and commitment to the town his efforts were seen throughout the community from keeping kids spot in great shape to building dugouts at Stone Park Roy's hard work and will willingness to help will be deeply missed by all who knew him but his legacy of dedication to Ashland will be remembered some news you need to know Ashland has maintained its top AAA credit rating from standard and pores signaling strong Financial Health and lowrisk obligations this rating lowers borrowing costs and benefits taxpayers S&P praised ashen's strong economy solid Financial reserves and excellent management but noted potential challenges with pension liabilities and one-time budget fixes the town remains committed to sound financial practices thanks to teamwork from town leadership and the finance department vote by mail ballots the town clerk's office has mailed out ballots for the November 5th 2024 state election to all precincts residents can track their ballots online and are encouraged to contact the town clerk if they don't receive theirs by Tuesday make sure you know your precinct number which can also be verified online SM O's home energy assistance program haap formerly known as fuel assistance offers seing Bill support for low-income households from November 1st to April 30th eligible participants may also qualify for additional services such as weatherization and Appliance Management Programs sustainability popups the office of sustainability is hosting pop-up events to inform residents about eco-friendly practices this Saturday from 10:00 a.m.

e e e come good evening everyone I like to call this meeting of the Dartmouth school committee to order for Monday October 7th 2024 would you please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible liberty and justice for all please be seated well good evening once again everyone we like to thank you and uh welcome you uh to uh tonight's dmouth school committee meeting I appreciate those of you you who are in attendance this evening as uh we're very excited and I know Dr Sab McGuire and her team are very excited to be presenting our uh District strategic plan um as a reminder this meeting is being videotaped by uh our actually our Dartmouth High School media uh class and it'll be rebroadcast on Dartmouth Community television channels uh on Channel 9 on the following days Wednesday and Thursday at 5:00 p.m Friday at 6:00 a.m.

here Mr GLE here you have a to the flag of the United States of America and to the for it stands one nation indivisible liy and justice for all All Right audience good way moving on all right review policies for possible first reading non-discrimination policy and notice so we have could be somebody at the door the door's online the door's online did you just get something well I mean you just got that call from uh some oh do you think he he doesn't know this I don't know um do we have that one in our yeah it's um p0521 a the next two items that we're going to review the non-discrimination policy in notice and the sexual harassment SL tile are entirely due to changes um that had been reviewed in great detail uh by initially um by the Trump Administration changed and the Obama Administration change excuse me and the Biden Administration and changed uh these are the law of the land uh there are injunctions on some of these things floating out there that um but nevertheless we are required to follow the law um and adopt the policy as and I know you guys are no strangers to laws changing um the most the one that seems to come up like every year is graduation requirements that we have to change all the time so no matter what's in our policy book we're required to follow la we're updating the policies to reflect the law at this point so these were established by C these policies this one is the um non-discrimination policy and notice one of the unique things about this I guess notice is that it's so long um pretty comprehensive that were told that we should have a short form because the long form would be too cumbersome like you couldn't put it on your letterhead it Beal the page so there is a short version of the board's non-discrimination uh statement and then there's a long version so both of those are in this document this this policy itself is really two pages the third page um is really just like the citations um and who to contact you know US Department of Ed civil rights but it's more or less um who's protected under Title 9 you know how I mentioned that there was that more recent ruling they call it the quote final rule uh it was released last spring and and then the policy was designed over the summer for our adoption but it was effective uh this summer so we are required to follow it uh Title Nine is I'm sure a lot of people are familiar are affords protections from all forms of sexual based harassment including or sex based I should say uh including sexual violence and unwelcome sex based conduct limiting somebody's ability to participate in uh the educational program also uh effective to end sex discrimination um and the policy that we'll review next is much more comprehensive outlining how the district is required to investigate and execute this policy again none of the stuff is generally stuff that you know we've written is just following the law so we're not going to like go line by line and change things to our own liking we're just going to follow what my recommendation would be that if you see things in here that you feel like you would want to change to your own liking that it be reviewed by an attorney because this follows the law I was and the law is pretty complex I was just making it clear to my brain yeah no I and I'm not I know you weren't you were just asking the question out of curiosity not making a suggestion that we just line item manipulate this um because we don't necessarily have that sort of flexibility if I can just ask ask a quick question if I'm jumping ahead I are we so 521 and the title 9 things are two separate things is 521 they are okay so we're talking about 521 right now yes all right so I'll hold my question and I will be honest with you you know given the complexity and recency of the tit line and I've been trained nevertheless um like I said given the complexity of it and it's being so new I couldn't call myself an expert and there may be questions I'm not to the other thing is that you know if you talk to attorneys there are certain questions that exist until courts settled them and so there may be some of that floating out there too wow talking about a preemptive Cop Out question huh all right so I don't know if there are specific questions about the um Mission goals objectives component here in this um but I can imagine like I think I said to you independently before that uh this the information that we're reviewing tonight A lot of these policies are super comprehensive they're they're many pages in length uh not just like the two to pages that we're used to reviewing so I imagine that there going to take some more digestion to facilitate perhaps a more robust conversation in the next meeting I would also extend to you that um if necessary we could have uh one of our attorneys come to the meeting and answer any questions if you feel like that that would be helpful uh the different points we've had speakers at these meetings um uh Rebecca Goldberg was one of our attorneys she came and did a really comprehensive Adam you were on the committee at that time very comprehensive overview of Title 9 actually like two hours yeah super comprehensive um and we've had you know Tom P came and did a school security overview for us once so um certainly welcome to entertain that if you if you want that for title l or any policy really if there's if we want kind of an expert testimony we've had Luther on Transportation recently so like just bring people back so any questions on the policy my only question would you what's the point it it seems to sort of summarized sort of like high level summary it is it really is and because we have to have so just more like a useful guide sort of and then let's go to the like the version The Cliff version yeah I think it's kind of the cliff note version but indeed you know we're required to have a short statement uh onti discrimination and a long form and so this does that as well and and there really are to your point really partner documents so are we eventually planning to replace this with this is that right yeah so the the board policy the current CPS policy yes I would recommend we just wholesale um change that okay Carol do you have another cop of those you have in21 thank you so this is what the law says we have to that right as it relates to title line yeah yeah okay yeah I already think it's better because it doesn't go into all those lists of things what about the Discrimination G just looking at that grievance procedure do we need to have that form so um there are forms that are part of the way that we um we execute the uh investigation process and would we still have those though there are new forms okay that have been provided to us through our attorney um it's I can look at if it's appropriate to add those as an appendex so let ask well they as an appendix policy yeah that's I don't know so having them and they're updated let's see what the differences are okay other questions Dr heran you good with that for now yeah yeah yeah are we keeping it though as we're not passing it on for second reading we just digest up to be first it'll be a first reading but we it's up to you if you want to at the end of this if um you make a motion to move before the board for a first reading if you don't want to move that forward without getting the additional information then don't make a motion to move that forward okay okay if you what's that I won't be making motion okay thank you so I was going to suggest that you know we wait for you check on the appendix thing and then fill in the uh our TI line coordinator all that District yeah that's actually on the online Link all that stuff F okay it's already there the printed one you don't but uh it is on the link version yeah I was just looking at the I kind of yeah so the new you're saying the new one the new appendix is there no no no the like says our title coordinator oh but it's on me but on and the old one is uh the forms for the investigation so the question is a couple of questions will answer so the next um excuse me the next policies are sexual harassment policies that uh cover both certified and non-certified uh staff and students so that's where you see on the agenda you'll see 4000.1 42001 and 5145 point4 those uh are designated for the certified staff 4,000 non-certified 4200 and the students 5145 the policy is a blanket policy that is uniformly applied to all individuals so the one with the cave emblem is the corre updated that is the one that with those numeral yeah that's the proposed you couldn't even write the title n off of our old without the whole thing being looking like a scratch out so this is from scratch I have two at least two copies of um go like back to front yeah double sided it should be double sided but then it goes back to a c Jeff is our attorneys review this one yet yeah this is uh this is the the policy yeah it's the standard and oh that's the regulation started the regulation question was that reporting framework about sexual harassment still in here or has that been changed you know the one where it was like treating students like adults in a almost like a CL proceeding instead of having their that's been updated and all yeah that's been updated um actually there is a section in here that does speak to um when you can release individuals names and how that's there is pii stuff in there so that's okay yeah and how that should be handled confidentiality compon that's good yeah that only three years this is dare I say better I don't know if better it's different it's there's some things that are better about it um you know in the old process there had to be like three different investigatory phases and then the third person was like the final decision maker and whatever and it really was complex and confusing this you can have one person conducting the investigation throughout um you know Robin as our title Coordinator would be certainly very involved in any of these things that come up and um unfortunately would the Incredible level of uh and there should be protections it's just the complexity of the various ways that a single act could violate multiple different um like Title 9 versus title 6 harassment claims and things like that and you know versus bullying laws versus so you have to make sure you knock off every element well what's the behavior could it be sexual in nature um could it be another form of discrimination or harassment could it be you know constitute bullying and all of them have different rules um which makes it really hard to follow and so you know that's part of the time we spent over the summer with two attorneys for our admin team trying to work through how do you follow those different things um because it just annually becomes a little bit more complex I think there was an effort here to make this more straightforward which is appreciated but it's still when added to the other elements pretty challenging so this is all cave yes yeah so this is the policy have one right now we do you want me to print it out you but it's just huge one that I figur replacing replacing all three of those policies right all three what do you mean all three three certified yeah the certified noncertified student versions of title n protections prohib prohibition of sexual discrimination and sexual harassment actually you know if that's updated on our website yet the new training yes so on our website so where did our old Title Nine policy come from same place yeah it's just the law is much different that's that whole final rule so C has already done the work yeah yeah and they have lawyers so yeah okay so and our lawyers reviewed it but the the um everything changed at that final ruling the um office of civil rights I think it was published this about a year ago or a year prior to the final ruling that was a ing period where they took feedback made modifications and then published what like I said it was called the final rule plan Lin's final rule so this summer we had training if anybody's curious on our website under District information there's a tab titled sexual harassment SL discrimination if you go there you can click making reports of sexual harassment bullying or anything else this is the training that we received over the summer um Carolyn Dugas and Rebecca Goldberg are our two attorneys you know most people when they think title n are familiar with how it impacted women's sports and equal opportunities uh for participation this is uh so I mean I think this is probably uh it's a 24-page overview it's not a quick overview but uh it really gives you the scope of what Title 9 is um different forms of discrimination harassment you know what you know quid proo versus hostile environment anybody can bring a complaint how the district has to respond under the law what do you do when you when you get a complain you know so this is the whole training what's the tot L coordinator do some definitions uh because like confidential and uh employees you know to to know what these things [Music] are pregnancy and related so you can't can't discriminate against somebody because they're lactating for example men an awful lot just sort of weird yeah I mean the first three paragraphs right lot so this because it happens that's why you I I know but you know but uh yeah it's different seem different it's more it's like really up front though like not Buri it's like a whole whole paragraph yeah right in the front yeah but uh so there's also a webinar on how to respond to title L user all on our website yeah actually District information those videos that give you scenarios and have to go through we're going to talk a little bit about our our video setup and at the end when we get other so I know people just want some time to digest that if you have questions now I'm thinking that if we're putting postponing the first again it doesn't matter what we do if we adopted this Thursday or waiting for 10 years the law is the law still got to follow the law so we still have to do this anyway so if we need time to understand it as a group and you want to look at it then you don't have to necessarily move it forward for a first reading tonight you I would just report to the board that there's a lot of information as it relates to title n that we're reviewing um had a couple of clarifying questions we're hoping to move it forward for the first reading after our next policy meeting I think that's fair too take the notes I am I'm just thinking this one there's no no appendices there's nothing to add to this maybe we should send this one go forward because we have no say on that any yeah I mean it's it is pretty cut and dry in terms of what we're required to do with it so I I would comfortable sending for for a to the full board for first meing but um and then if somebody else on the board comes up with wanting to know more then then we can go because at the pce that we do these things it's going to be a couple months before oh yeah yeah I can send this to the full board also for their you know just in case people have questions for yeah yeah I can share the yeah first yeah and we'll tell people that'll come forward for the first reading on October 17th you know if you have any questions the three Monon process starts then basically okay uh the next item I I can't believe that this just got adopted now really and updated um because in 2019 I was on the um task force is the superintendent representative uh that made recommendations for this update in essence really just trying to make the fingerprinting process more uniform but they I think in the era of enhanced security and identity theft and whatever what you'll see is um the model regulation is much more comprehensive than anything we've ever had is it relates to Security checks and fingerprinting um the information around uh requesting checks who can do that who oversees that data what are we required to do like say our Human Resources Director oversees these checks right if she's terminated within 24 hours we're required to notify um the state who will pull her credentials to that data to that information stuff like that um so so they don't get like a a hard copy report they get access to information somewhere else digital yeah so what is all the stuff in the middle that we're getting R of is being replaced with the revision part um the stuff in the middle on 41 that's crossed out so it's our that was our old policy that's the old yeah yeah this is this is cover yeah okay so it's shorter which is a good oh y so the revised policy goes to a page no no no oh yeah the policy is a page yeah but the regulations are several pages okay these are the administrative yeah regulation documents telling us how we have to this is navigate this fill in the blanks yeah so the there's only one person who has who approves or has access to the the background checks no we have I think three uh our HR Director uh subordinate and Vin okay Vin oversees the whole thing the overseas is that person specific no um you have you have to list the coordinator with the TAC coordinator they call it uh the non-criminal agency coordinator is the Human Resources Director she coordinates it okay in our Cas it's a she right now uh who happens to be retiring um so that'll change and she her credential revoked but Vin oversees that uh so he's the local agency security officer yeah Vin yeah it's I put it in here already car oh you did already okay chief operating officer um so he he identifies the people who can access and pulls credentials or anything if necessary and polices it basically curious why are we scratching School nurses in yeah you know be honest with you I don't I don't understand that either um unless they're covered under another law I did want to ask about that the attorney because I don't I have a question mark on mine too that doesn't make sense to me and the the uh fingerprints I'm guessing they're not s anymore they are oh so the ones where you have the they can be they can be but at the are Cher police it's digital digal the digital and they get submitted but I don't know if they're still available they used to be pretty recently that you go digital but here you're not the ink ones yeah I'm sure they pretty much so and in in this it doesn't specify what we require either one is fine yes either one is fine but I think I think the system go to the police department the system must be well you have to go to the police department but the um system is probably purely digital now I would think across the state because I know like when you go to chesher they there is a digital pad that you just they roll your finger on yeah okay it's better not way faster yeah think way faster now than it used to be to have plus I bet you get cleaner prints too yeah and it it was so backlogged the old system you'd wait forever for prints it was really bad uh it's definitely sped up like 12 weeks was that high you're supposed to have it within 30 days I think yeah 30 days after they're hired they have to submit the state stuff but you know we do an initial back background check just in case there's a question um that you can do a criminal record check on somebody um hello come on in young but um you have you can you submit that digitally and you get a a feedback but the uh fingerprinting is much more comprehensive okay so and that's all controlled in the police department it's not like some or at least it's a certified third party like an experient or something it's yeah it it goes through law enforcement channels it doesn't it's not like a we not responsible at all for any of the data except for the report that we get that's part of their our access and which is why part of this regulation is like I said somebody gets terminated you cut off their access within 24 hours stuff like that so are we holding on to this one until we get the nurse question resolves yeah I don't know to if we push it forward we can just tweak or talk about that yeah meting yeah I this one's not quite as comprehensive or sophisticated it's pretty comprehensive in terms of the regulations but it's pretty straightforward that basically we have to fingerprint somebody within 30 days do the criminal background check and the regulations are all about what to do if somebody's violating that trust what to do so's you know misappropriating the information stuff like that but I I do have that question about the nurse myself because I don't remember that ever being part of the process but then again that was five years ago so maybe Jody will have the answer to that c I'm just searching the yeah I'm curious so they have transaction fees in here is that something we're going to have to go back and change at some point because they changed their fees they have the dollar amount yes all seeing that so the regulation what are after all the stuff that scr that we scratched this is the data Connecticut or is this because it's theirs it's not ours but we're putting it our policy and see number two says you can do a hard copy finger a yeah see there on appendix D and like it talks about the nurse yeah board ofed nurse or nurse practitioner so that's why I don't understand yeah I mean that's a state of Connecticut Forum all right so let's a ask if we have to include appendix D because you're right every time the to back change the costs either that or just put a disclaimer on the append could we Char subject to change the uh statute reference is wrong say it's the one on the first p 29 yeah 297a but here it keep saying 10- 212 221 uh 10 they don't 10 is the um that's the um everything related to uh education so what was it 29 29- yeah Mark correct me if I'm wrong here is that that's not going to be in here that's going to be doesn't exist I've tapped out my knowledge of La books I'll have to should be back my wife's the attorney yeah we search anywhere would they put a search bar there that's sh 297 what's the name of it again just hit that and see what it does criminal history record checks required for S any provision in general statute such check should be requested from the state police Bureau of Investigation and shall be applicable to the individual identified in the request requesting party so it looks like it's a legit reference procedure and fees yeah so yeah it's in conflict with itself it says the the state can charge a fee equal to the amount paid by the agency under the subdivision so apparently this is the state's getting charged so they pass that on to the consumer kind of thing so at least in terms of a citation it looks like it's the appropriate Citation for the policy so at least that question's answered we do have a question about the nurse and we have a question about the appendix appendix [Music] D okay pile of questions wait on that one okay um we okay to move on to suspension and expulsion due process that sounds like fun yeah good times um this is oh good God the full cave policy um if you flip through it the substantial changes are in red the red changes or or the statutory changes from last session um I reviewed it and I would recommend that we make the wholesale change from our existing policy to this policy um because I found some of the references in the old policy a little dated and the uh the stuff that you see in red is kind of woven into what cab had identified in their policy if there's like a lot of it's kind of straightforward but if there is a difference if there's a place um that we as a school system and this is just my interpretation were more inclined to possibly change would be Pages A and B of the policy that those pages are a little bit more uh principled in nature they're a little bit more value based than they are uh legislatively legal based talking the thick yes packet right the one that's not suggest in regulation it's newest policy yeah newest version of this policy so Pages A and B like I said these are a little bit more value based um I I honestly the only thing that um I don't really have a a real issue with anything for me um like the biggest issue I have honestly in the first two pages is policy guidelines number one clear expectations and Communications I think one could read that and think that um establishes and communicate clear behavioral expectations and the consequences of violating them there is comfort and ease for some people in reading a chart that says if you steal from the calf you shall get three floggings um if you steal from the calf twice you should get six floggings you know if that's the case I don't really need an assistant principal to do discipline you know um Ed the talking horse could figure it out the this is nuanced there's a reason reason that you know theft in the court of law doesn't automatically get you two years I mean there are a lot of lot of circumstances that our team needs to consider and I don't like the idea of of putting in a policy that says establish and communicate clear be I'm okay with clear be behavioral expectations and the consequences for violating them I as long as it's understood that there's discretion and there's um the consideration of different variables in that process you know if I told you that so and so stole from the cafeteria because they were threatened with their life by the chief Thug in town that if you don't bring me back cookies you're a dead man that Chang things you know or that they haven't eaten in 4 days and they stole a lunch that changes things you know I I just don't like the idea of trying to boil it down so finely to black and white that the discretion and judgment is lost that's the only one really that I have an issue with on the first two pages but the whole thing first two pages is like I said um more value based and I I can stand behind all these things that one makes me a little uneasy though so so we can alter it right yeah we can establish and communicate clear behavioral expectations yeah these like I said these first two pages aren't really grounded in legislation so everything that comes after it you know for example the definitions those are legal terms that I would we advise we don't change except where they where they've changed well they've added it because of the they've added language because of the legislation yeah so it appears that certainly in the first two pages yeah the point is to do everything possible to not certainly expel well that's even suspend right yeah so I think the first two pages the point you know the restorative practices part sure restorative practices could include suspension and you know other forms of consequences um restorative practices don't exclude that um but what they do on top of that is to uh have some sort of educational component some sort of making whole if you will of the individual who might be the victim if there is one um or the school um or started practice you know to to use a simple example somebody vandalizes the bathroom they may have to work to pay off the soap dispenser that they broke you know with the you know work with the family to to do that that's a restorative practice doesn't mean you don't have a day in school suspension or something on top of it um but it's a restorative practice you're trying to make whole um and you're trying to educate because you know say if if just discipline was really effective we we wouldn't you know the treasure Correctional would be the best school in town it's just not trying to do more education so and restoring is part of that education process so it is I don't have a problem with it like I think these are all things that as a community we kind of get behind um encouraging personal responsibility of course engaging families in the community yeah I think that's great these are all things that I you know personally but I I'm part of your group so if you look at these and you think you want to change them you have latitud to do that and without worrying about impacting the law it's the next whole bunch of pages in the policy that are so Bard or so uh legally driven that you really can't change much so basically once we get to I page D is that how how we it where red writing starts I would say c yeah because they're using definitions for like exclusion removal all that's legal okay and then any red even though there's no statutory reference to it we to assume that there's a statutory reference behind it it is it definitively is yeah just like expulsion it doesn't have it built in uh statutory reference but it's all at the end of the policy St should statutory references be added to the changes no because they're all at the at the back just most of our policies so when you get to P that some of them have statory ref like yeah alternate education and right dangerous drugs and narcotics so you know well actually a lot of on on page e have references so things like what constitutes a dangerous weapon yeah those are things that are very clearly defined in statute but I'd say when you get to page y um where it has legal references that's where they have the compilation of all the references that are used to make up the first page Yeah well yeah Y is where it starts well I i' hate to to be a uh a stickler but if I recall in graduate school and I'm writing research you still have the site yeah this is an apaa this is an APA format you know that I was just wondering if we're held to that or not this is legal form okay yeah no EPA here all right just making sure MLA and APA Chicago citation Chicago so you know like the other ones I mean this is ultra comprehensive um it's like 30 pages double-sided but um again it's all grounded statute and then the appendices are so they really go through like everything in here yeah and actually so you saying you were against you didn't want to have this no this is it go it outlines everything procedural I I don't want um a chart that says if you skip class then you get one day of detention if you skip two classes you get two days of detention or whatever Oh you mean the punishment side this is more about what to do this is ultra clear about action occurs right this is ultra clear about the procedure right right right okay yeah which I'm find though that's interesting though that law had to be created to create procedure I'm not sure that I had to but right legislators like to do that yeah that's an unusual law so the appendices at the end like you know the I would I would swap those out only in the sense that um you know it does refence shipment a good one I would take that out I'm sorry it's just I guess maybe I'm confused so all this stuff that we're reading here is not stuff that you and your staff had written this is all legal reference all almost all this is like this is legisl sat down and wrote all of this no this is provided by Shipman and goodwi the law firm to cave and Cave issues this to districts this is because I would say it's very detailed for yeah should this this all right and then you can tell too even in like I said the appendix a letter um I me goes that throwing snowballs there's a reference to uh Shi of good one you know that would we would have to change that going back to the finger printing one I just double checked what they sent us and those appendices are from the previous poliy it just didn't cross out going so yeah they're gone the question Still Remains about the nurses and policy see all about so why do we even have this appendix a this letter it's just included in is an example of what notification would look like and I honestly I I had a disciplinary situation today that I was working with and I used this is a good guide for how to follow the law I found it pretty straightforward which I think is good for not just our admin team but the any parents and anybody who's got a question or curiosity about we hand things so thought it was pretty good well I'm glad you're not just expelling students willly mil after Public Schools try to avoid expulsure possible sometimes you have we don't leave a lot of mystery yeah okay so does that mean so since it's so explicit is there a not a grievance process but a u like a a hearing process so that some you know the person who is expelled can have because weren't we weren't we doing something with yeah due process so is there where is the due process part so the the an expulsion hearing is conducted okay with the administration and relevant Witnesses and the um individual who is up for expulsion has the right to legal representation um they can if they choose ask for the hearing to be postponed because we have to give five days notice it's there's not it's a tough window because if you get suspended today let's say you get suspended and that behavior um like was with a possession of a dangerous instrument or something like that you made a threat then you we would have to decide and have a hearing scheduled in the next five school days because you have to give five school days notice of the hearing so you have to get things arranged pretty quickly to determine if you're going to go to an expulsion so let's say it's a Nob brainer obviously we're expelling you um May maybe I could get a letter out tomorrow if I can get the hearing officer scheduled for you know the end of next week or something then the family receives notice and can make a determination how they want to handle it they can represent themselves they can hire an attorney ever they would come and it's almost like a legal proceeding where they're presenting evidence the administration is presenting evidence the hearing officer ask questions they look at you know any relevant case law that may be out there the hearing officer then renders a decision um the recommendation is often for expulsion of up to 180 school days one calendar year the the hearing officer might be able to modify that based on their findings they may modify that they may rule that the the student should not be expelled um if expelled we provide an alternate educational placement uh and that could be anything from Individual tutoring to an out placement um and this is all to for general education students if you receive special education services you all those same things would happen but you also have what's called a manifestation determination PP where there's a PPT that's held a planning and placement team meeting where you review the individual's um special education needs and a couple of different things could happen there they could say well we don't have enough information to make a decision as to whether or not the behavior in question is a manifestation of their disability we need to do more evaluation in which case it's protracted up they could say yes this is clearly a manifestation of their disability you can't expel this student because of their disability you have have to change the program now or they could say no this is not a manifestation of the child's disability and you proceed forward with a expulsion hearing then the alternative to those is something called the stipulation agreement in a stipulation agreement the um parents and and District might determine or the if they're 18 or over might say you know what it's um April 15th what you did was wrong um and frankly we could expel you for a year for this but you don't have much of a disciplinary history we're going to expel you to the end of the first marketing period next year uh well we're going to expel you for one year but you only have to stay out of school till the end of the first marking period next year if you come back and you make another mistake another disciplinary issue it the expulsion is reinstated for the whole year um but you know that's an agreement that parties come to and there are usually caveats to that so if you're out let's say until the end of that first marking period in the same time you have to be an active particip your education you might have to do community service something related to whatever the issue was you might have to get counseling you know for something um and then if you fulfill those things will'll allow you to return at the end of the first quarter pursuant to the rest of the agreement so there's a lot to all of this um and usually the administrative Team Works in consultation with our attorneys to make sure that we're not violating student um but often times if you're going to an exposion hearing you're you're also concerned about protecting the safety and Welfare of everybody else in bu it because expulsion is reserved for situations really where your presence jeopardizes that or creates such a disruption that education can't be meaningfully held and then none of that is necessary for suspensions right okay for suspension you because that you would suspend student while all this other stuff is getting lined up right right so if you're going to an expulsion hearing an exposion is um more or less a suspension anywhere from 11 days out of school to 180 so you can expel a student for three days just 13-day suspension basically um but with a suspension you need to um meet with the student and give them the opportunity to to share you know their side of the story of what happened uh and then you it's not a court of law U but it's kind of like the reasonable man uh standard that the administrator determines uh that there was definitely a violation of uh the school policy and there's standards in here that outline what constitutes things that are suspendable um who is suspendable and for how many days the law has been more prescriptive in that you can't suspend a second grader for 10 days you know um and that's makes sense to me you know we've never done that sort of stuff but I guess the legislators felt the need to do that for whatever reason so you know that's that's also outlined in the policy like pretty much everything like yeah was pretty comprehensive yeah okay and pretty rigid but I guess that also tells you that someone somewhere didn't do this probably or perhaps a number of times yeah maybe yeah there's no APA cation on that right sool did you days before yours uh yeah you you used to it's been a long time you used to have a little bit more time and um now it was at one point just five days notice um not five business days notice which has made tougher yeah um it's not bad if you get like a vacation day or something in there but if you don't you got to turn it around pretty quick and I think sometimes that can be detrial to the student because you're making more of a snap decision where it's like you know we're going to air on the side of protecting this rest of the student body we're going to move to expel which you can always do and then resend I guess but okay do we want to kick around uh rewriting that first line for Clear expectations communication um I wouldn't mind taking a look at the first two pages actually is that the only place that is that the only place you had it's that's the only issue I had on the first two pages um but like I said the first two pages are really uh values driven uh and so if there's latitude to change anything it's those first two pages everything else is is you know really grounded in the law yeah so like for example firearm it says missile having explosive or incendiary charge of no more than a quarter ounce you can't say well you know what let's let's make that e else I mean um are do the so this is from Cade do all of these fit in with our current expectations current policies within the first two pages yeah the only thing that like I said I think that's um ambiguous is clear expectations um you know even if it said establish and communicate clear behavioral expectations and uh uh and that there will be cons consequences for violating them you can just say establish and communicate clear behavioral expectations and consequences even that I don't like because of you know the consequences for two people engaging in the same behavior could be pretty different depending on the circumstances depending on but there are consequences yeah and that's why I said and that there you know clear behavioral expectations and that and that there will be consequences for violating them um and that there are consequences I mean if you guys can look at that that your thoughts expectations consequences question I have on that are we we understand that there are expectations do we have to list all of those clear expectations or is this just assume think in the um the individual School level the principles communicate out in their handbooks what the behavioral expectations are for that building okay because it looks different Darcy obviously and it does at CHS so okay and all the schools definitely maintain their own handbook that's available on our their school website so you're just talking about number one right yeah that's so wouldn't that just be like C the next 20 Pages like well the second part is see the next you know more or less but um when it's talking about clear expectations and Communications I think they're the that um I prefer to frame Behavior expectations in a more positive light like you know that students will be Community contributors for example or um you know maintain a a decorum in the in the cafeteria things like that than than to say you know behavioral expectations are and the consequences are like you know theft is keep going back to theft because you know pretty straightforward one that people understand that you steal something and then the consequence is this the B you know um even if we set us communicate establish and communicate clear be behavioral expectations uh and that they're through the through the uh student handbooks at each school I think is fair I think that's bullet point two that's you know the discipline policy and procedures is all of us oh so to say that we're the clear behavioral expectations are inherent in the the handbooks really so if we want to WR that just write that you don't even have establish and communicate clear behavioral expectations available in the student handbook yeah at each building okay then get the consequences out of that completely yeah and how do we ensure that all students staff and parents car me are aware of the so the beginning of the year we send out stuff that they sign off on having seen that's a leap of faith but is that the is on them um parents square is that parent Square yeah yeah you you'll get a notification through parents square at the beginning of the year that says you have to do or is it power power I think it's power well you you'll get notification through parent square that you have to sign off in power school yeah so yes both both yeah the Synergy is unbelievable yeah amazing so all the STS are only change I guess right as long as we're good page two there policy guidelines excuse me yeah that's pretty again like I said everything is there's nothing here that is even fringey it's all kind of like yeah it's like reading school mission statement nobody's ever going to read a mission statement but yeah I don't know creid strong learner anything on page two is like binding and more aspiration well is it as it's not really aspirational it's more of a guys summary yeah kind of I mean it's it's it's called guidelines for reason guidelines you know guidelines you said not Bing so are we sending this for first reading to the full board with that one yeah one change change I think so so let's um let's make the change here now Adam had referenced for on the fingerprinting the policy was kind of like the cliff notes and the regulation was the meat and potatoes of how it gets implemented for whatever reason this is the inverse of that because there's a regulation that is a boiled down taking out a lot of the protocols in here um this is yeah this is the next one regulations for students we don't have to approve regulations though no it's just a review oh okay we are amending it it's not something that gets moved forward for a reading per se but so this is just your implementation of thatc policy right which these are dovetailed the only area that I would point out to you um I highlighted I don't think it's highlighted El but R 5114 G number 15 it says an expelled student may apply for early readmission to school readmission shall be at the discretion of the Board of Education the alternate language being at the discretion of the superintendent schools um I think the super tenant is just better positioned to know everything that's transpired uh with the student and subsequent to the um expulsion um so I would recommend that the superintendent well plus if it if if it was board if it's literally Board of Education that have to have a special meeting in executive session and I I think the thing that one of the things I like about a hearing officer is that you know when you're 16 years old and you make a pretty significant mistake that results in expulsion when you know we have a special meeting of the board and stuff it just attracts a lot more attention right you know we're not looking to condemn the kid for life you know it's not really restorative practices but and then there's a certain level of discretion is available to the perpetrator and I sometimes times they don't deserve that but when you're 15 I think it's hard for me to find that you don't deserve some level of discretion you know and they're usually minors still right so almost always yeah so as young as 13 years 12 13 years old have previous boards have you brought the board together on kids individually never okay leave it to you yeah and neither has my predecessor I mean that's going back I've been superintendent now 9 years and Greg was superintendent for like eight years I think so it's going back a long time it just hasn't been practiced because I don't think it's in the best interest of kids so I think we would use the alternate language in this case and again since it's regulation you can kind of make it however you want we can manipulate it now we're aware right we always try and make you guys aware than just going a road yeah and like I said you know for it's comprehensive as it is I found it to be a really good resource make sure we're following the policy in particular so it's actually one of the better things that I've seen put out good good I'm already ready for El how exciting electronic devices so this is um for itself this yeah right um so there are two samples here I I would recommend that we don't move them forward tonight but just discuss it but certainly if there was something that you really wanted to to do and move forward that's great um there's a copy in here of the electronic devices policy it's dated you know December 2000 wow so you can't have your beeper you know or whatever so it definitely needs to be updated give me another any laser pointers 2000 laser pointer was your electronic device in 2000 and this cave this is this is brand new based on guidance provided by the state department of Ed on August 21st I'll be honest with you there's nothing Earth shattering in here um in essence it's just uh indicating that kids K through6 we really don't want you to have your cell phone um you know and even frankly at this point we don't want it visible anywhere at any grade level um but at the high school we we manage that a little bit differently um if a student had his phone out at lunch we're not going to come snat it out of we're going to discourage them from using it but you know treat 18-year-olds differently we treat 8-year-olds so um I think it'd be better if we could review yeah both both of these we can come back it also says in the guidance that we get parent feedback on this so I think what I'll do in the next meeting is um designed a survey that you guys can weigh in on and we can send out to parents after this to give us feedback on any sort of guidance meeting I want to take that make sense yes yeah okay I think um what was that our last meeting you had said that we have the kind of more take an approach like n Tre like smoking yeah or taping off smok thank EAS as many kids don't smoke as they used to yeah I wish they were smoking and not Bing be a heck of a lot easier to catch in some respects that in water too yeah AB but um you know yeah I mean when you understand the data in the credly adverse influence of social media on adolescence uh it's sobering and concerning and so you know we don't when we think of other things that are so uh detrimental to kids in their health and development we wouldn't let them do smoking breaks you know we shouldn't let would it be helpful to F breaks break out our smoking policy to see if there are any interesting idea paragraphs that we can lift out of there or something or I don't know oh the smoking policy there's like you know depending how that'll be entertaining there's nothing else I want to pull it out just a little see I appreciate that suggestion that'll be interesting so we don't consider like schools Chromebooks to be their personal technology use is that correct no no that's um and is that because we have all the blockers that we yeah it's incredibly well filtered okay unlike your cell phone right you know no that's that is not filtered I just want to sh yeah and you know it's not only the social media and kids comparing themselves against other kids or harassing people on social media that sort of thing it's also the constant distractions I'm re L uh adjusted adult I can't tell you how many times my phone has gone off you know because of my watch right now you know constantly over the last hour and a half but I'm somehow able to sustain myself but I'm not 12 wondering if it's my girlfriend you know well I was thinking in terms of I mean you also don't want kids even getting on their email during school yeah there are there are a lot of protections that you know we could discuss be interesting you know I could have Scott con might come and talk to you about you know the nuances and the level of control that we have over a student Chromebook is is comprehensive um but I are there any chat features um I think Google Hangouts is disabled but I'm not positive let's have Scott come have a conversation all right do you never know kids may find like maybe the teacher enable the chat function in their classroom for some reason to have a yeah not not Discord what's the one that corporations use um slack yeah like a slack Fe I don't know if we have a slack like feature yeah you know well something yeah I mean that would be like a Google Hangouts and collaborative project or something well yeah you can chat and in essence I guess you can chat in Google doc um when you're working collaboratively with a partner uh but I mean I think instructionally we don't really like you're going to sit in rows work collaboratively each other and using Google Docs features it would be so primitive for them that I'm sure they would lose their but hey I mean if you're locked down you find way well you know one a person in the same class let's say right I'm say the window still be pretty primitive and you know a lot of our instruction is designed better than that so that we wouldn't really be the well that's good possible so would that conversation happen at a policy meeting or we do a policy meeting as soon as we're discussing the electronic devices we can invite invite people if they want um do all the kids use the school Chromebooks or they bring they don't device okay and what at what grade level do they take them home um seven seventh grade we give you one they don't go home no those are in the classroom seventh grade we issue you Chromebook to take home we still I'm sure it's possible that somebody could have a loner anry grade that they might take home or something but in Ence I mean in the the rule and always exception to the rues C okay and you don't have to answer this question okay is there still oh how do I put it a loophole if a Chromebook is accessed on a non-school Network you know in reference to let's say some uh problems from a yeah I mean so the the uh if you're on your home network yeah the restrictions that are in school are not as robust right if they're being used at all so it's sort of the same thing and at all totally and the browsing history you get cookies on your home computer that feed the um advertisements that you see and things like that just like the same way if you there's no like ad blocker on the Chromebook or well that's got to be right when you're on our Network absolutely no I me at home my son is on his Chromebook yeah let's have Scott and share I mean bring your questions all right cool Scott is the guru networking is not my strong suit so at least my experience being my son's option is to be onook right exactly yeah yeah so he Associates it with school right exactly yeah the teachers are watching all right so it looks like we're hued to have an interesting conversation on technology and personal devices and whatnot so we're going to pause this one yes okay so then we have two for a third reading which be more straightforward we have the equity and diversity policy um we had some notes I don't remember June 3D good God oh my apologies I thought we had already done I have to ad i' have to review that okay yeah it is starting to come back to me and I had I regret saying that I did not check the legal reference on that so we may have to we're going to pause this yeah there's a lot here that I want to review legal legal legal yep all right so we'll come back to this one sorry about that and then Transportation I know that one we the most recent one uh June something June 3 yeah because we did meet over the summer and we postponed I just thought I thought we got a lot lab dayb day I feel like thought I thought we were there yeah I thought we were there too the draft that we sent to the board s to the board yeah can it must been that pull up my entire email here but I can double check that um this is the transportation policy uh that we went over at n right with Luther and Vinnie yeah so this I feel very confident that we are let's you know good on this one so even though it's not official yet I'm assuming that most of what's in there is in practice have you found it to be working yeah we haven't had any not the god to my level um because usually there's one issue that came to me and it was very unique um and it wouldn't have been addressed in this anyway very unique that's um there I'm sure there's a line under the just perview of the superintendent's office right or something that's a you know I mean ultimately the superintendent before a transportation Committee hearing is like the final Authority but then you know ultimately things can go to a hearing before the transportation Committee of the board um I've been like I said superintendent N9 years we've never had one we had if you recall last year I think maybe about this time no a little later more toward winter we had a couple of parents come to just discuss issue yeah um that we resolved uh and and I think you know our school system is incredibly customer service oriented um we should be uh and we resolve a lot of these things before they become problema so yeah no we hav't I haven't heard other than the one that wouldn't have been addressed in this know so actually so in regards to HOA stuff is there there's really nothing in here about HOA and that would be more of a town issue I'm guessing as enforcement of any issue like what was talked about last year was like that curve right so no one was really doing anything yeah so right now um we're in the process of working with the town Planner on a proposed development in town that has really unique uh features related to topography and sidewalking and stuff like that and so we're working with them to tell them you know all right well here's where I think we could do buses here's where we couldn't here's where our policy you know we don't go down a cue saac that is you know you just can't turn a bus around in so the bus stop would have to be at the end of that cuac um even if it's a mile long because you can't get a bus in and out of there um so like we're working with the town to try and help them with design but yeah a lot of that stuff is for stuff that's already existing has already been in practice for years you know great so so there's that one um I would say just before we go to the part where we're uh deciding what we're moving forward for first readings and third readings um Mark had sent me a question about a couple of policies uh one as it relates to our responsible use for um staff and the other is social media so in the 2021 school year um we enacted a policy that requires uh staff members to personally acknowledge that they've read the uh policy and accompanying regulations and they sign off and we had done that back then um and this this is for I'll show you right here on our Vector so this is um an interesting look at the mandated trainings that Educators have to complete yeah or at least a snapshot of them so in s to 10 minutes when this loads there we go um so like these are all this is my personal account uh these are my assignments that I have to do bloodborne pathogens all the ones with the green check marks I've already done them all um good for you yeah look at me I did my homework I have done except for the policy on uh I've done most of those too because you have to do as a hospice volunteer I had to do those PL yeah right so responsible use policy is the one that is referenced in here so this is all basic basically it shows what our policy is you have to review this and then you can ultimately check off acknowledging that you have reviewed the policy um that's responsible use of of technology technology yeah there's another component to this though about um about social media use uh that at the time when we did this in 2021 we had legal guidance on what you can tell staff to do and not do as it relates to social media some of that stuff has changed a little bit so I had Floyd review it um our attorney and Vin and I are currently in the process of reviewing the policy against Floyd's recommendations so that very well may be coming back to us um if it if we don't have to make any sort of substantive changes I mean Floyd did make some recommendations but if either way I'll give you an update on that one so we'll be taking another look at the social media but you know so the question was our staff does have to sign off every year they've been directed now with the deadline for October 31st okay to have it read and signed off okay so that's in place I just wanted to update you on that thank you appreciate you bringing it up I didn't bring it up we well the yeah the individual who brought it up yeah yeah but the um credit credits do yeah yeah yeah in Vin's office we had some turnover and the people that navigate vector and that one fell through the cracks and unfortunately it wasn't one that I'm like hey where is this like you know we have a slew of them I for that was an onon there so my apologies appreciate that person bringing it up we we've resolved it good thank you yep all right so moving forward you have you want make yes I'll make a motion that Carol will make compliant with the way motions are supposed to go so I move um to policies be moved to the full board for consideration for a first reading and that those up to are 4 Z 400.1 slash 42001 slash 51444 sexual harassment Title Nine and the second one is 5114 suspension and expulsion due process and a policy for a third reading and a vote right yeah would be the Transportation uh policy 3541 need a second discussion second discussion I was just read I was just trying to figure out which ones we weren't doing so we we're we paused on the fingerprints non-discrimination nondiscrimination and electronic devices yeah and then uh Equity is being R yeah we're still double checking that with the attorney okay good all in favor yes motion toour so moved second all in favor we are adour

isn't it yeah all right who wants to go first all right I think I'll start all right um so the weather is slowly getting chillier yeah it's um being somewhat tame for October thankfully uh fall sports are you know slowly coming to their ends other than football speaking of football coming off a triumphant win over York um and look to win against LT and H Del uh South for a homecoming game in the next two weeks uh you know there's definitely a buzz about homecoming and the exciting events that are near uh like the parade and Spirit Week academically the National Merit students from the PSAT were also recognized so congratulations to them also I wanted to highlight the DECA event that took place last week in which almost 200 students attended um the the fall leadership conference Deca is now uh the biggest Club at dgn and the event that we were at we were the most dominant School in terms of attendance uh so it was a definitely a very good representation from dgn and it was a very good experience for everyone there um being able to meet other students from other schools and being able to network but also just hear some of the speakers that gave fantastic advice for you know just business and also just the competition um over the last weekend the empowerment Club led by Ryan guses also hosted the backpack project um so the club sponsored a packing event on Saturday October 5th in which 60 people from the community helped pack uh backpacks for and and packed over a thousand backpacks filled with Hats gloves toiletries and other Essentials for the needy and then coming up tomorrow we have the fall Coral concert and the fall Jazz Band concert on October 30th overall an exciting month and students are definitely excited for their uh four- Day weekend this weekend all right so even though we're on opposite sides of town we've had an amazing month too um like rayan s sports are slowly coming to their end golf just had their conferences which both went great and two weeks ago we had our homecoming week which was probably top three most exciting weeks of the school year overall filled with school spirit we started off the week by doing school spirit days and then on Friday we had a school spirit assembly which is always fun for the seniors but overall everyone involved we played games recognized notable alumni uh we also recognized the people who won the National Merit uh I think it was three and obviously so amazing four sorry about that and overall just a great great time Saturday obviously we had homecoming crumble was a big hit um overall just a great experience and I'm super happy that we had that week school spirit frenzy obviously and uh following that week during access classes we had our pickle ball tournament staff versus students and um it was just an amazing time overall during our classes we got to sign up and go watch the people play that got elected from each class and it was just a super great time we got the tipers on even though we didn't have class with them and it was filled with the atmosphere um yeah overall just an amazing time for down gr sou thank you all right uh as the board is well aware going into this school year we are working on establishing baselines around strategic indicators and measures uh Scott is here today with Karen and Kelly to report out on a couple of them this evening Scott would you like the Magic Remote sure around this time yeah yeah all right well thank you for having us here and and I wanted to say for you know Karen and Kelly um I appreciate their expertise the dedication and passion that they bring um to give you a little insight of how we operate and collaborate together um we meet monthly in what we call like our associate principal attendance and discipline we've been lay on meeting and we've been doing that for years um so the nice piece is when this got introduced to us we're like this is perfect because we're looking at data um Don you mentioned at the opening we use five labs to run our reports um so we're always kind of looking at this information and then trying to react to it so um we appreciate um Karen Kelly are going to walk us uh through hopefully I'll click this the right way there you go um this was meant not for you to read it um but for just a visual um we have the Strategic indicators that are created in a kind of a onepage document um so with attendance we're looking at the regular um attendance rate for students we did add in to the information The Chronic absenteeism data um so I'll turn it over to um Kelly's is going to start with the north data all right so you're looking at our Baseline data we are hoping to see the green going up that is your daily attendance rate which means that's the percentage of students you expect to see every single day and then the purple you're hoping to see that going down with our intervention because that's the chronic absenteeism and that's 10% or more the students has missed it's kind of a rolling Target but it's 10% or more um excused or unexcused so that doesn't you know why they're absent doesn't matter in the purple okay so we're hoping that that purple goes down so we'll just kind of drill down into to the numbers and just looking at the bottom too you can see that we did improve our daily attendance rate by 1.2% um we're hoping to see that climb up to that 96% that we had back in 2015 but again our goal is 100% all the time and you can see the chronic absentee rate improved by a little over 6.2% um and that means that our kids are um coming to school more regularly and again some of the interventions that Karen and I and our teams and really the entire School Community has gotten behind are having those proactive conversations around students who struggle um finding interventions that work for them uh working with the DuPage Roe on our aim our attendance intervention system which is basically groups that we get together that are not being supported um through maybe an IEP or 504 and working to make connections to them because we all know connections matter and this is the similar data for South so again the the green is the attendance rate which is the number of student the average number of students in the building on any given day and you always want to see that one getting higher um the blue should be like Kelly said trending downward and we're proud to see that it is there that's always kind kind of a gamble when I look at the data as the year progresses because it's based on the percentage any student who has been absent for any reason 10% or more of their possible student attendance days so if we've got a transfer student who starts in October and has missed a day they already have missed more than 10% of their days because we're not to October 10th yet right so um anyway so but but we monitor that Weekly I'm looking at it weekly and then like Scott said we formally are looking collectively at it monthly and um we're proud to see actually Scott if you want to go to the next slide and look at the actual numbers we are proud that our attendance data from 2023 to 24 uh The Chronic absenteeism rate fell over 7 percentage points during the spring semester of 2023 we got like very involved in a creating an attendance data monitoring team and building out some tier 2 interventions that had positive effects um and so we're proud of that and then we also are seeing like that that attendance rate start to come back up as as The Chronic absenteeism goes down um we're trending back towards pre-pandemic levels which is also really encouraging yeah can I ask other than just kind of the pandemic is there were is there anything about the criteria that they use to measure absenteeism I know they've added in mental health you know I mean I know there's some you know they allowed students to use some discretionary mental health days but haven't changed sort of how that fits in are there any other factors that you because we that's kind of you know from 20 up till 2021 we were it jumps a lot and just is there anything else that when you're looking at Chronic absenteeism that does you know like again really kind of encom it encompasses any time that they're absent so we're still um working through kind of a situation where kids have you know gone through a pandemic and um the landscape has changed a bit in how they how they view education and how it's how they can access education right um so we're still seeing that and but I you know again both of us on both sides of town really do see us trending in the right directions in those spaces and really um demonstrating the value of being present in the building um but then just your daily attendance rate is just how many kids are you know present in they can be one in the same you can be in The Chronic absentee and you can also be part you're also part of the daily attendance rate as well yeah if I can jump in like Karen and Kelly said the you know you mentioned the mental health is and Karen mentioned that all the days are considered you know like towards the chronic absenteeism so the state a lot you know it issued out you can have those mental health days but it also counts against a student if they take off in terms of their chronic absenteeism it doesn't count against them obviously in school itself but it it does though show up on your chronic absen statistically the data yeah so um so that that just poses you know challenges with that too so um yeah so mhm and so like 2024 is like year to date 2024 would have been last school year oh okay okay is the jump because of a mindset from Co I think maybe a mindset but also like Kelly was talking about how they access education so for 2 years we had them accessing it from their bedroom right um and we built out a lot of reports to make that possible a lot of teachers invested a lot of time and energy and resources for students to be able to teach themselves at home and you know here's the the video of the lesson to review and here's the Google Classroom to access these things and so we've really had to refocus the mindset that yes you still have all of those resources because we found out those were really good supplements right and it matters that you are present and you belong long and so I mean we're we're working hard but we're moving in the right direction yeah and I feel like it's a step process because our teachers I've watched education change I've never left High School I've been doing this for 27 or what years um what I've seen our teachers do is really empowering our students to take ownership over their learning and that's really amazing and and we now need to take him to the next step kind of what our PE leaders talked about is empowering others and showing them the value of what you have learned and grown can retach someone else like when I'm in a classroom and I'm observing and I'm watching students teach other students it is so powerful um and it's so impactful and our kids have grown in their own ownership and agency and now we have to use that to promote them doing that inside the spaces that we have truly and I think it is like I think we're getting there and we're seeing some positive results of all of this well do you think it'll be uh easier to see the attendance rate going up once um um sorry once this group of students goes through the school system versus um you know the ones that have been in with covid get through that do you think that that will um increase your attendance you don't I think it's a guess I think we can't wait for that to happen right and I like to make a a seven percentage Point drop in a year came at because of a lot of hard work right um and so right I I don't know kids who were in kindergarten during the pandemic are what fourth graders now like that's another eight years before they're done with high school so so the answer is I'm not really sure but I also know that I don't want to wait to find out and right but it'll be interesting to see if those if those numbers change because those students are are are at maybe a different mindset than the students that we have right now um because it's still fresh in their minds sure so I don't know just thought the positive side maybe the adult mindset I mean as we all know my company included all now going back into the office the adults kicking and screaming and so I wonder if you'll get I know adult support the efforts is not probably the only thing but like you know and then you know people kick and scream and then you know your teenage students are like I've been in school for I've been going five days a week for two years so so maybe that will help but congratulations on your efforts to get to this point I know it's been a lot of work very good numbers very good numbers thank you do you have any any information on how it is so far this year or is it too early so yeah like I said it's it's a moving it's only October yeah it's a moving data point throughout the entire year yeah okay so the next uh measure is looking at discipline um again as I mentioned earlier Karen and Kelly and I meet monthly as lays on to talk about attendance and discipline um the discipline that we're going to look at again um we just took a screenshot of this for you it wasn't meant to be able to read it um but looking at um students that have the B code so if you recall we have a and b code student violations um we're looking at the B codes which are the more significant violations to student behaviors um and conduct and what we did is we we are looking at students that have two or more um so Karen and Kelly will talk to you about that we also included in that all the students that received bcode so you can kind of see those numbers um in comparison and then we also um which we've been doing for the last um few years with the path program we've also been looking at students that repeat um uh uh bcode violations um and so we're going to share a little bit that we shared out at the parent teacher advisory um meeting last uh may I think we were um with you with that so again Kelly's going to start sure so you're looking at our North data and to highlight what Scott just mentioned in the First Column we're looking at students who receive two or more bcode infractions so bcode can typically in years past would result in an out of school suspension but we don't do out of school unless it's really egregious um and instead we put path into place which we'll see the results of that but we're noticing we have a slight Improvement um with students who have received two or more um our enrollment went up a little bit and so our number went up a little bit higher than we would like to see with the 103 for a student with a B code violation and what we're doing is we're analyzing this data to see if our invent our interventions with our students is appropriate and if they're making an impact and the key here is in the next slide when Scott goes to the path so remember path is our alternative to an AOS school suspension because we value the time with them to help support them the the best indicator in all of this and the one I'm most proud of um is where that little arrow is pointing to that only five students repeated an infraction when they went through our formal path and that's the three days of support and four to six weeks of after care that comes through our path coordinator so that's making a huge Improvement and then the 60 plus um we try to if any student is in our in school program we really try to support our student with path we call it light so if it's just they're in for only one day we still want to make those connections to the student for whatever reason why they're in there um and try to implement some strategies to help support them so that they don't you know find themselves back there so it's not a formal path they're not placed on a behavioral contract they don't have a re-entry plan um but these are students who have you know come into that space and our team tries to implement some minor supports um depending upon what infraction cause them to arrive there so we try to that's what we call pathlight over at North um but the key there is truly that five out of 37 that is that is a significant number for the team um it's all their hard work of really making connections with students and um helping to support them so our numberers for our yellow if you see that little yellow it's goes six to five that's just the repeat Behavior path interventions your green and then the purple is the count of incident so I'd like to see that purple going down um and working on interventions to help support them we're working right now as a pilot program um at North to offer instead of detention time if they want to elect to do community service inside the school or outside of the school um and we're just starting this you know we're at the very ground level but we're trying to find ways to connect students um into the community okay so very path path was not available in 202 2022 is that correct um full path was not full okay it was partial okay yeah so the last two years of data is our full-time path coordinator and that makes a significant difference okay okay and then the South data uh so last year we had 100 students who had two or more bcode violations and 116 students that had a bcode violation at all uh again though if you're looking at um in comparison to the year prior where trending positively mhm by a lot mhm Yeah by a lot yeah that's very positive very positive yeah uh and we had a 17.3% recidivism rate um so 13 of our students repeated um a a path a bcode violation and went back to path um out of the 75 students that were there but again we want to see and and we are bar like mostly with except for the yellow one there every bar is lower um and that is what we want to see and Kelly explained it all so I won't repeat unless you have questions you'll have to go first how do you choose which students who have a bcode violation are directed towards the path intervention yeah so every Behavior incident is evaluated on a caseby Case basis but um we do kind of have a a PL a starting point for certain types of behaviors so things like being in possession are under the influence of drugs or um a fight or physical physical altercation stuff like that so there it's the bigger behaviors things that would have before path resulted in out of school suspension time um students are now assigned to the path program in lie of out of school suspension where they're potentially unsupervised at home or in the community and not getting um any reteaching of behaviors right we wouldn't send a student who can't solve a math equation we wouldn't say go home for the day and think about it um and expect that they could come back and solve that equation right so that's really the the philosophy behind path is you made a mistake and we're going to bring you in we're going to talk about why you made that mistake and what your strategies and coping skills are and supports um and your plan to not make that mistake again we might see a student who um might have been inciting a fight they they didn't actually fight so on the first time that they did that they would maybe have more of traditional being in school but they did it a second time well they need more support so we're going to go path at this point so that we don't see them making that same pattern again okay and if I could just thank uh Nicole Wallace and Patrick Fleming who are path coordinators and then we have Travis Edwards and Keith bollock who are our uh saps who do prevention work on substance and obviously our Deans you know support all this so we appreciate all their efforts and they work hard to to support the students when they're um you know violating our code of conduct so our support staff that's in the space too are uh they do such a fabulous job job John Rush is at North and Dan pisk is at South and they truly they go through training too um so that when Pat's working with the student one-on-one because there's a one-on-one component there's sometimes group components that we still have support in the room for the students that are there to work academically um and to also access all of their resources so they connect them to their Alpha teams their counselors their Deans their social social worker they show them how to access their teachers through office hours and how to schedule appointments so they're really working together it's a much bigger team um than one might imagine I I'll highlight security for being supportive of the program and being present and um always being um someone who knows the kids and knows like to how to intervene with them in the Commons in the cafeteria it's truly an entire team effort this type of presentation tonight on these two subject matters um is exactly what I want to see going forward um you're bringing data um to support the policy changes and um decision making that's going on and Reporting out the positive impact it's having um the the data isn't necessarily the the driver it's uh Rea reaffirmation of the the good decisions that are being made um so you know Han I'd really like to see presentations like this going forward because adding that that data component to these types of decisions is just further providing credentials and uh support for you know the the work that's going behind this I I really think that the five Labs you know software is fantastic and has a lot of potential to make us a better District um I'm really happy to hear about how path is having a positive impact on students um that's what we're all about is you know we don't want to exclude our kids from the Fantastic resources we have in these buildings so I'm really happy to hear that those two programs both at north and south are having a positive impact on our students yeah thank you we are too it's it's path is absolutely the most transformative thing I have seen happen in my career with regard to student discipline wow yeah that's sending them out in the world is yeah it's like backwards intive right yeah yeah and and it also supports your overall attendance message do you feel that we have enough resources in that program so I mean you're you're saying it's it's super powerful yeah so I I this year's students that are new to South are bringing um some more behaviors than we're accustomed to seeing um and so now I would tell you that we would welcome more resources and support that said we also do have um typically at South we have two support staff members who work in the space and we have a vacancy we haven't been able to find someone to fill um and so those of you who know folks send of my way um but and I will say though our new uh Student Assistance Program Coordinator um at South Travis Edwards has done a lot of pushing into the space and just working with students who don't necessarily present with substance issues which has kind of traditionally been the role that our saps have held um but he's really engaging with students and helping Nicole Wallace the path coordinator do some follow-up work with them and processing with them while they're there mhm I yeah I again when I said a team I mean the Alpha Team really has supported this program too um so that there is more than just two people you know reaching out with those connections and of course I'd love all the resources for kids who are struggling and they they need a little I mean if they're going to make a mistake i' rather it be within our walls so that we can support them to make better choices for their future um but I think we're you know we're just very grateful that we have this program I just ask about your opening the like I know we have a team of people that work in this do this work but is it train teachers or these people that trained with other skills on how to kind of manage these challenges or like what kind of skills particular oh sure have that work in this yeah so somebody who uh is patient and a flexible thinker um who also understands that behavior is communication and it's not usually personal though it may come AC cross as personal because the student is seeking power or Escape or fill in the blank um and so someone who is eager to kind of learn and wants to connect with students um you have to be a certified teacher no you do have to have the par professional Ed uh certification so um there is some college required but um not a not a four-year degree any other questions no thank you thank you thank [Applause] you this this is a tough one thank you both for being here you're always welcome to stick around but you're also thank you I've got teenagers at home too thank you Scott forers this I do want to point out to the board that the indicators and measures and to anybody who's paying attention to this the indicators and measures are as the evidence of advancement on our strategic plan if the board remembers every one of these goals talks about 100% of our kids will either be meeting our expectations or we will know who they are and be working to close those gaps I think in the presentation that you heard tonight you see that's absolutely evident in the work that our teams across the district from administrators to every you know everybody involved in that team that involves teach teachers administrators support staff security bar professional there's a lot of folks across the entire organization they're involved in making that happen and achieving the goals that the board has set out and expected so this is your first bit of evidence yeah that we're doing what the board expects and we have the numbers to back that up and the evidence to back that up and you're going to see more of that kind of come online uh as the year goes on it's really good great fantastic Travis has the Talking Stick talk stick yeah so we're going to switch gears and we're going to talk about uh facility rentals so uh just as a as a remembrance uh four months ago we spent uh in two board meetings we talked about our rentals and uh changed some structures there so if you remember uh we went to week night rentals after 6 p.m that was something that we added we also restructured our fees where we looked at area schools to see are we in line or are we not right so we set the rate for our B category and then it decided to uh at our C would be double that rate uh we didn't change any rates or fees for our A's we also did slightly increase our supervisor our Personnel cost related to that to those different things so just as a a Rememberance of of where we were at and when we left that meeting there were still other conversations that were going to happen and we were going to do that at the policy committee so we did that um in August and we talked um and and talked through several different things uh the main focus um and please feel free to to add anything related to our you know our conversations at at the policy committee meetings um was how can we provide additional opportunities for our feeder programs what does that look like and when we'd say feeder programs some people might think Just Sports we're talking about both Sports and activities right so what does that look like for um programs that are going to directly benefit our our school district and help our students our future students have experiences in our facilities um that is going to be beneficial so we uh we took that as well as we talked about the windows and some of the challenges that are are there with our our rental Windows uh such as if we have different things that we do we're Park District we have that that uh that collaboration with them and that partnership that sometimes uh our uh our timing will impact other feeder programs that maybe are Park District Affiliates because we have the agreement they have to wait until we have our our numbers finalized and our dates finalized before they can actually get in and have things scheduled so we talked about that as well is there anything that we can do with our with our uh are scheduling I think those were the two big things and I'm going to highlight some changes was there anything else that from those no okay so then um after that on August 23rd pulled together a lot of different individuals you can see their names there um and as you've seen from my experience here all of the different um perspectives that we get from our different groups we have a lot going on just last month you heard from Brandon and Dave about the the number of sports that are going on you've heard about the number of activities that we offer the number of our that our students are involved with so our priority in all of this is making sure that our kids are getting access and that we're not diminishing things that we're doing with our kids that is a a strong Focus for us so what was important was to pull together people that oversee all of these different activities oversee our buildings and grounds and say is this possible can we expand and provide some different things so we pulled those individuals together and the resounding response was yes we can make it are there going to be challenges with with doing it yes there are but we feel like we can do some things additional that we're not currently doing so as a result of that meeting uh we talked about because if you remember uh this is both uh Sports and activities and a lot of our activities surround and can include our auditoriums auditoriums are a completely different uh setting than anything so what we did was we came back and we had a separate meeting just on our auditoriums and we pulled in our Auditorium managers into that meeting same group of individuals but we added our Auditorium managers and we talked about what ises that look like what is that space and so we we talked about is there space is there time in that space that we can make things happen CU our auditoriums are also very busy and it takes a lot of different work to get our auditoriums ready for the different events right if they're putting on a play they've got a lot of work that they have to do in that setting so we talked about blackout dates are there for a reason but we still need to check because there might be something that we can do uh with that but we also talked about the differences with that space is that many times if if someone is going to rent that space for an event uh such as a production they need a lot of lead time so what does that look like how can we change the window structure for that to make that more uh palatable for and to give time for those decisions to be made uh for those different organizations so then we came back uh just a couple weeks ago to our board policy committee and and presented what I'm going to present tonight uh and went through the the the adaptations that we think that we can make and that we're ready to put in place should the board uh want us to go that that route so that's just kind of the background and and going through that so I'm going to highlight some of the the bigger changes related to this um if you remember we have category a b and c that's in our current existing there's no change to category A's um when you look at category B we change that to C and I'll come back to we added category B right but it was important to change B to C because of the price structure so um Not only would he did we change it from category B to category C but we added the information of that Community Youth Sports Club that would have less than 60% of participants residing within the district boundaries of District 99 and that's going to come into play when I talk about new category uh B category C changed just the name of it to category D so the new category of of B is that is for those feeder programs when we talk about both Sports and activities so looking at the park district affiliate program that they have the main thing that is in place for that is that 60% of that group's residents live in the boundaries of the park district so taking that same thought process we're looking for if there is a a community Youth Sports Club that has at least 60% of the residents living within our our district boundaries okay District 99 boundaries um then they would classify as a category B um that means that they would be a they would be a Downers Grove Park District affiliate or can adhere to those affiliate CR Criterion conditions and specifically for that six 60% uh participation rate same thing with the youth activities right if they came in and said hey here here's our roster we have a easy way of checking it thanks to Google where we can say hey this is the percentage of of the individuals that are on this roster um that are either in District or that's not the number so that's why the the addition because in in the new category C bless you bless you where it says Community youth sports clubs that's just what it used to say but with the addition of category B where we have the with more than 60% or with at least 60% we needed to have that iation of with less than 60% so any questions about the the jockeying there of the of the different categories okay and then the other uh when we look at um some different areas that we we also talked about in our um in our meetings was supervision so in looking at at this we have um had conversations and again had these in in the multiple different uh settings about what does that look like if we have a community use sports program or a community youth activities program um that had an event that was outside because our other fees with our supervision and different things they they can add up uh pretty quickly so what we uh talked about and determined that we could do is that supervisory fees for uh can be waved for affiliate supervisors for most Outdoor Rentals there's two things that would uh be problematic with that one is if they need keys they need keys we're not going to hand over keys to another program right so if if keys are needed for that outdoor rental we're going to have one of our rental supervisors there the other thing is if it's a a large event where we're going to have a large population there we need to have some crowd control we need to have our our individuals there in case anything were to come up um but in that we're going to kind of have a shadowing experience so the first time that they would be uh have a rental what we would do is we would have one of our rental supervisors be there they would Shadow whoever the affiliate program uh they would have someone that would be designated to be their supervisor they would Shadow our supervisor for the day they'd have to pay for that rental uh for our supervisor um and then they would be good then the next time to be able to go ahead and do that on their own as long as everything is okay if it's not we're going to put back in our rental supervisor if there's problems um if we have issues uh with that so that's the main thing all in indoor rentals will have a rental supervisor a District 99 rental supervisor we're not going to budge on that there's a huge safety uh things related to to those type of events and the other thing that's on the screen is that percentage um so again we we had that 100% set last uh in our last iteration so what we're looking at doing is is cutting that um 50% of the new class C would be what the facility use fee would would cost all of our Personnel costs all of those are flat we don't change those depending upon what category uh that we have any questions on any of those highlighted changes and the last uh thing that I want to cover are application window changes so as a reminder we had four we had four Windows um and you can see those in the upper right hand corner um those were listed out we had deadlines that they had to be submitted by um we have changed that language to the application window open date because in our guidelines you can rent something up to you have to give at least 14 days notice for us to be able to process to be able to go through and get everything worked out internally in order to make that happen um so it's not a deadline you're you're encouraged to have that done as soon as close to that opening window date as possible it gives the the most opportunities again it is a first first serve basis also looking at the different criteria though of the groups that we look at obviously our things um take absolute precedence so our AUD torium renal went from four Windows to two windows and you can see they're they're larger Windows um we feel like this is going to provide a lot of opportunities a lot more opportunities for uh companies if you will that want to do a production in our in our facility that they could they could do that um looking at that this applies to all rentals right this is not just for category B this is for category a b c d when we look at these windows this applies to all of the of the rentals then we looked at um our other spaces all of our other spaces uh We've Whitted it down from four to three windows and you can see the most notable change is that uh march by March 1st that's when that application window opens you can schedule uh things or request to rent from June 1st all the way to October 31st um the other windows are the same as as we had uh before if you look September 1 no November 1 to February December 1 is March 1st to May 31st that does not change if you look at the current over there to the right but that March window or that March opening having a larger window where we're talking about the summer and the fall is uh we can do that because we have a lot of things finalized uh by that time so that's an overview of the of the larger changes um that we feel like we can make happen we feel like it would provide additional opportunities again for uh not just our our feeder programs but everyone when we look at the rental Windows uh specifically that are could provide some some different opportunities any questions how many auditoriums do we have one at North and are there like a big one or a small one at South how many are there so we we have the same at both where we have the the main Auditorium and then there's smaller theaters at at both the small the South one is more set aside for mainly Productions our one at North is used a lot for professional learning um where we have a lot of teachers and and different things that are that are happening in that space Bas so when are are we operating under the uh September 1st window than for both right now yeah so right now we're operating under that Cur current right so we're in that um uh November 1st to February 28th is is the requested calendar uh time frame um so if we were to go we're planning on bringing this back uh for Action at the next meeting that would mean that that December 1st window would be what we would be able to implement right so there's no there's no change on the all other spaces but there is change on the auditorium where then that is going to open met up of of May 1st through August 31st and is this pretty easy to find for people on the website or how do people get this information yeah so in in our um on our district website under facilities we have a rental page um and it has these documents obviously it has the current documents that are there but we are working on um implementing ml schedules so you've heard us talk a little bit about that we're making sure that we have everything um locked down internally before we go and start doing our external rentals but we've done a lot of work in the system and we're really close to being able to put that out there what's really cool about ml schedules for our rentals is you have to go in and you create an account if I'm going to be a renter I have to put in my Certificate of Insurance before I can do anything I have to make sure and and categorize you know this is the category that I would fall into that has to be approved and then you can start going in and making rental requests we can again in line with these windows right when you go in and you say hey I'm looking for this it will tell you if that space is open or not it doesn't mean that that's a a given that it's going to happen but at least you know hey this is this is available and there's a lot of automation then that happens within the system so you click submit then it goes through and there's a workflow and it follows through and goes through different our different staff members that need to review it and go through there's an estimate that's provided um it's not final but then there we go through and so we're um we're looking hopefully uh in the next month or so we'll ask one of our renters hey would you mind going through this process and give us feedback on what that looked like um from my experience we used ml schedules for rental in my previous district and it and it works really slick and it's really user friendly to be able to go through but you have to make sure again internally that all of our stuff is is is in good space right and we have it all locked down and we know that it that those dates really are open or not so that will be something else that will be all of that information will be included in the process itself it'll be laid out um in 2018 our community supported um a referendum for District 99 in the amount of $136 million and with that um we improved our facilities both inside and outside um and I think it's important to reflect on what work we're talking about being done here is to give more access to our community to the great facilities that we have um and I think should be commended for the work that he did because um clearly I think Travis could have just said I'm going to you know revisit the fee schedule and just stop there but he didn't stop there what he did going Beyond restructuring the fee schedule to potentially open up um new avenues for new renters is he looked at the logistics that goes behind it and he spoke with leaders within our buildings to gain an understanding of of what this would mean because there's a lot of planning that has to be done you have to get athletic directors and coaches on board to put their schedules in well in advance in in order to open up these windows for it to actually work and so there's a lot of work that's gone into this to to allow this this program to actually function and hopefully function well um so Travis thank you for all of the work that's gone into this um from the policy committee I just would like to share just a little bit of an example about the rental of the auditorium space you know our buildings in large part spe specifically our Auditorium said vacant during the summertime it's a clear opportunity for Community organizations to utilize those spaces to potentially put on a play for a community like youth theater program but the problem has been is that when those organizations have reached out to our our facility managers in the past they've wanted commitments you know at an earlier early enough time frame to be able to utilize those spaces but we just haven't been able to commit to those so what Travis has done and and tackling those logistical issues is now made commitments internally within District 99 so that those types of organizations we can open up those windows and we can allow those types of organizations to utilize our facilities so um I can remember when we went Terry when we went through the master facility plan one of the things that we talked about was potentially renting some of our facilities and developing other alternative revenue streams and you know I I think if we if we do a good enough job communicating this and informing and educating the public that these facilities are available we can actually create some Revenue stream here from our facilities and as long as we do it in a responsible um and um you know a responsible approach that does not tax our facilities yes um and it does not open up our facilities to you know potential liability or or our uh degradation then I think we're doing the community uh uh a favor here by opening up our facility so I'm really excited about this I'm really excited to see what type of um impact this might have on our Revenue stream here because you know I asked in the policy committee meeting Travis are you tracking how much we're getting in rental income from our facility use and after we implement this can we can we take a look at that and see what the discrepancy is um so I think this has a lot of potential I agree I want to add like our our our staff were how can we make it happen right so I I didn't have to like Strongarm anybody they were they they understand that this is something there again I I mentioned there's probably going to be there's going to be growing pains right because this is if we increase and and I may have to come back and say hey with this increase we need to do this right whatever that is it it may be that we need to we need to look at and and maybe add uh some Personnel or hours to be able to cover because with the number um it may be that we need to pull back on some things we'll we'll adjust will we will monitor uh the data and look and see and uh obviously as well as the feedback from our staff what is that look like have we set something that's manageable um have we created something that um yes we're good with or are we seeing challenges and what does that look like so that's the great part about our guidelines and every and all the processes that we have with this we can revisit them and we can make changes right it's it's a living breathing document we we honor within the windows that we have right that we that we go through and we say hey this is the commitment that you made this is we're going to honor that during that time but we can make changes mid year as as we need to as as we go through I don't foresee us coming back and all the time but we'll we'll monitor it and see what that what it looks like but I think this will give a good opportunity for um for newer opportunities yeah and I think our community would be excited to uh share in our facilities because they are beautiful facilities and you know rather than hug them closely I think letting them out for the community to see what their tax dollars is have um paid for is a is a big plus for us can I ask me that was one example the the auditoriums in the summertime like what do you see is is it opening up in the evenings I you talked about that in the past and the the auditoriums in the summertime are those like the biggest opportunities we're talking about for new okay I do and and with the with the addition of the the new B category it allows for some of those feeder programs to have more access right when they look at it's more attainable to make that happen because of the price structure yeah and it makes our our future students feel more comfortable being in our schools and uh especially when we probably have um I'm going to say upper classman there also it makes them feel so much better so that's a huge Plus for us all around do you do you anticipate like when the athletic directors were here there was talk of like flag football and you know some of these like so if we were to add something that is going to take up a practice field or you know something would we have the the ability like how is is this something that's Yeah in our in our program our things come first right so even if and that's that's spelled out if you remember when even when we open up to week night there are going to be times when we're going to have to cancel events that renters have had because weather happens and we need that space for our students right so those types of things and and that's where the communication really needs to be well done that people understand yes we we've committed to this but if if our students need it I need our facilities that's going to take precedence so if we keep adding different opportunities for our students that means that the rentals are going to go down right but that's we're here to serve our our students number one well if we're in the football playoffs There's an opportunity for us to yep go down state so would be a good thing were you going to say something yeah uh sorry just two things uh one just recognizing you know Carrie asked does this meet the needs Travis spent a lot of time meeting with our commun leaders of our community groups to find out what their concerns were so I think what he brought he's brought to you addresses many of those concerns uh and then two just uh process-wise this is some of this works like board policy so tonight is essentially the first review of these changes if you have concerns or feedback you could reach out to Chris or Don who are on the policy committee who have reviewed this or Travis or myself uh and then uh barring any unforeseen suggestions or changes this will come back at our next board meeting for approval and then as Travis said we'll be in effect for the next window I'll take the Talking Stick back got it thank you Travis thank you Travis I know it's a lot of work thank you all right uh another project that uh we've talked about with the board as we've worked through uh a couple of related uh complaints over the years but just changes that are happening in Title 9 and those kinds of pieces you heard from your attorneys earlier this year about those things um we have discovered that uh the board has seen over the last couple of years that sometimes if someone has a complaint or a concern in the district and they file one of those formal complaints they get uh they file complaints through multiple Pathways and those Pathways can cause Conflict at my level of the superintendency and at the board uh level where uh we need to make decisions on one complaint process but are shielded from information related to that through another complaint process that's going on in parallel so uh the board asked for for the administration to work with the board's attorneys to start to look at a way that we could work through this challenge as a result the legal board's legal council has recommended revisions to the policies L linked below or listed below this has all been shared with the board to review these things this is kind of a first opening piece we have not yet really uh done all of the changes in this this is to give the board an idea of the scope of the amount of work that's going to be involved um this would revise all complaints related to bullying discrimination harassment uh and it also would end up with revisions to our uniform grievance procedure so essentially any of the complaints related to bullying discrimination or harassment would go through board policy 2.26 5 which is the same policy that uh governs Title 9 complaints which you were trained on earlier this year so all of those would be routed under that revised more formal complaint process that ultimately can end up with the board then any other complaints would go through a revised 2.26 policy that we're working on with uh with the board's attorneys so we would ask that the board considers this the first reading of the policies although they may come back multiple times this is just kind of the first look at kind of what's being proposed I'm asking for permission to continue this dialogue with the board's attorneys um we are kind of Blazing the way here and we're helping ourselves but I think we're helping uh districts across the state because we are taking kind of a leadership role and looking at this through a different lens and trying to avoid some of these conflicts uh if the board uh has consensus tonight to continue to do that work there is a cost entailed with this because we are working with your attorneys to do this uh if you're comfortable with us continuing this work we would then present hopefully final versions on October 21st however it may be version two and we continue this work and that kind of thing so uh if there's minor revisions from what I've already presented I'll bring them back on October 21st and for consideration and adoption if there's major kind of revisions then we would do another uh intermediate review and then come back in November uh for approval so that's kind of where we're at in this process I just I just need to kind of know from the board are you comfortable with us continuing uh for the administration to continue going down this path yes I think it's a minor cost to us really for what it will say well the complaints are very expensive what what it would save us in the long run exactly so I think I think that's really important too so yes yes all right so uh we'll continue working thank you uh next two this came out of the board out of the policy committee uh part our annual review you know that the board's goal on the uh policy committee's goal is to make sure we're comparing against press and being as aligned with those recommendations that come from that as possible a reminder those come out of the Illinois Association of school boards so out of that there are two policies that we've come across that are in the Press manual that we have just never adopted so we recommend that the board adopts these policies they're in line with what our current practices are um it's just good policies to have in place so uh one talks about homework and you can see some of the key premises inside of that so any questions on that one is the big change with is with this new policy just your you have a more active role in it no we just don't have a policy on it at all oh we don't have a policy at all so this would just be a policy that outlines this isn't in line with our practices within the district but it serves to be then the board okay has that policy that should be followed with this there was no homework before there will be no there were no rules from the board guiding homework yeah yeah wasn't that there wasn't any so that one's the one on on homework and then there's another one on achievement and awards um so it talks about that we'll have a uniform process for calculating grade point average and honor rooll which we do right this just sets the expectation from the board that we will and that we have a uniform process for presenting Awards and honors and promote fairness uh once the assuming the board is interested in these two policies especially this one we have uh historically had a group of Administrators that have come back come around every so often and looked at our Awards and honors uh it's been a while since we've done that so once the board approves it the the next step is always writing our administrative regulations our internal processes that go with the board policies so we will call together a committee of Administrators to look at our processes for that and make sure that our current practi is align with this new board policy uh any concerns with either of these uh if ones do come up after you've had a chance to review them this is the first review of those policies out to Chris or Don or myself and uh these will come back at our next board meeting for approval all right uh my last one for the evening is uh for eight years uh iasa the professional superintendent organization in the state has offered this what they call Isel program it's the I it's an acronym in an acronym so it's the iasa school for advanced leadership uh it's a cohort uh of about 25 to 30 superintendent uh that come into each of these cohorts there's an application process the board has to support it because there is a cost uh to it there is also a commitment of allowing me to participate in that and to do the coaching and homework that's associated with it um everybody that I've talked to a lot of super tenants that have been in this program a lot of the peers that I trust have gone through this program uh I've been interested in it for a while but because of responsibilities at home uh I have not applied to be in this program in the past some of those responsibilities have changed recently um so uh I'm requesting that the the board uh support me in applying for this I need a letter of recommendation from Don um I believe that it is in align with the goals that the board has set for me around professional learning um so just trying to get a consensus from the board and so that John so that Don uh could submit that a letter of recommendation on behalf of the board as well yeah I don't have a problem with that yeah I I love it and I don't think we have many people have a sense of the breadth and depth of your role and how every day can be so different in your roles I think this is a great opportunity for you and I hope you're I hope you you apply our we all agree oured well thank you I'll apply we have a letter we're working on and I'll let you know what happens if I get accepted or not and if assuming you will because you will uh then just could you report back to the to the board about your experience and you know some otes about you know how the cohort went yeah after each of the sessions I I'll probably give you a report and our normal report so you know what happened okay have you been to any of these before no uh but they have a bunch of nice social events and I like to go as like the second for a lot of other superintendents so I I've been in the the circles a lot with with those leaders you're a known entity yeah you could imagine that the folks that are giving up uh it used to not be Thursday and Friday it used to be Friday and Saturday so you could imagine folks that have worked a whole week and then are going off to continue their professional development over a weekend um they're pretty dedicated at their craft right so it's been a good group for me to be around uh I'd like to kind of be a member of the group formally now and good exposure for District 99 y totally yeah all right thank you for your support on that yeah uh Julie do we have any visitors okay then can I get a motion to did you want to oh yes Communications that came in over the weekend yes um I apologize we don't have anybody here but we did the board did receive uh three communications over the weekend regarding uh just distribution of political materials at uh South High's parade and homecoming game uh I know a few board members have reached out to Don and and to me about potentially putting this on a future agenda so part of board protocol is asking the board is this something that you want to talk about further at a future meeting before you decide whether or not to put it on an agenda I just want to share with the board what some of our internal practices are with these uh these events um first starting with the homecoming parades these have been long-term Traditions within the district uh many schools don't have the this is kind of an old-timey tradition uh in District 99 we have traditionally invited uh the superintendent or superintendent the mayors of Downer's Grove and Woodridge and the seated representative that comes from the like the largest portion of our attendance uh area and the seated Senator uh from that um they're invited to come attend sit on a car pass out candy just as the board is invited to do that any of our dignitaries that we invite to participate we provide them the candy they're providing their time and traditionally they've ridden on the floats and have just passed out candy and wave like everybody else and that's the extent of it uh it is my understanding that at the South High uh parade we had uh elected official Distributing campaign material we do remind them before these events that they're not supposed to campaign as part of of the event so we are following up with that individual to reinforce that that's our expectation that uh campaign material would not be distributed um and then at at no events is political material allowed to be distributed if somebody brings it to our attention that that's occurring we would put an end to it like that it's not okay uh the usage of our logos or any of our likeness as a district on any of that material is not allowed we have followed up with people in the past that have done that we'll do that in this situation as well so that's kind of our ongoing practice um Don and I were just interested after sharing that is there any interest in discussing this further either at the full board or or at the policy committee regarding our yeah specifically like should we continue the tradition of inviting this you know Senator and or representative to our homecoming parades does anyone feels strongly that we should bring that as a future board topic or are we all comfortable with just continuing with that tradition as is I don't have a problem with them coming as long as they don't distribute uh campaign material yeah I think if they're they're on state official time and so they ought to be on on state official time like they're held to a set of Standards where they're not engaging in political activity so any well-minded official should have known better um and I don't think it's going to be a problem in the future hasn't been a problem never been a problem before this is the first time occurrence of this so I think again if we just reinforce the this is an official event that is not a political event um yeah I don't see a reason why it would be a a big problem are you asking if we need to modify further yeah mod discuss it further modify our policy revisit our policies or are you comfortable with our practices as they are I'm comfortable I guess with the practices as they are so long as I maybe we need to provide we'll reinforce them yeah I we do it already but we will make sure especially North High is up and coming so we've already talked to the North High team about you know about reinforcing that and I will follow up with the individuals specifically yeah that's helpful clarification for me too and I think as long as we it seemed like we just got a few emails at the board level I understand was the administr or the school did not get a lot of additional we received two at the board level and one at the school level okay yeah so I think as long as we're following up and we're encouraging people if you see something that isn't permitted you know please bring it to the attention of the school or the administration so yeah I'm fine so the consensus is we don't need to discuss this at a future board meeting okay we're doing okay all right thank you then uh I need a motion to adjourn so moved second Terry moves Chris seconds all in favor I I all right we are adjourned all right thank you all all right thank you

an unknown male dressed in black and wearing a backpack approached door number 12 at Fox Chase Elementary Mel attempted to enter the building by pulling on the locked door school nurse Karen kala advised him that he was not entering through that door she then witnessed him move to door number one where he entered the building by following a parent and student inside nurse kala responded to the office immediately as she recognized the potential danger the Mel posed while in the office the mels were responses to staff's questions were not reasonable and he again attempted to gain access to the secure area of the school nurse kala bravely stepped in between the Mel and the door leading to the secure area of the building she then stepped toward him toward the Mel signaling that she would not let him pass and this ultimately L led him to exit the school building nurse CA and the office office staff took photographs of the mail and his vehicle which helped to quickly identif IFI identify him and allowed pce police to take him into custody nurse Kal's actions that day showed dedication to school safety and were a clear example of personal bravery nurse ker recognized the potential danger the Mel posed and acted to keep the students and staff of Fox Chase Elementary safe nurse kala should be commended for her bra bravery and diligence [Applause] we'll invite the board to come around the front like we do her Pride please and join in a photo with the officers and nurse C hold hold on want go in there [Applause] I I just want to um again congratulate congratulate nurse kala and really appreciate her for her her her thinking and her calmness and really her efficiency um that kind of quick response really truly does save lives and we are so grateful to you and your family for your vision and your care um and also to the police department those sentiments are echoed um Mr Bell who works directly with you all the time um often speaks to that level of commitment and commitment to coordination and collaboration and we have heard of many instances already um over the last year and a half that I've been here board where this kind of collaboration has really made a difference for safety in our district and we thank you and um all the First Responders for your commitment to our students and to our community I know this is a uh thankless many hours job that we do not see and so we are truly appreciative of your sacrifice and your commitment let's give him a round of applause [Applause] next I want to invite um we have this evening U Meredith teer who's joining us from the buildings and finance department from the finance department Mr Oba do you want to introduce Miss teer for this special presentation on Medicaid thank you Dr katti uh Miss mer Timmer she's the claims honor list for the district and her role is to make sure that we capture all the uh the claims that we entitled to and those include Transportation claim uh orphanage claim Medicaid Claim and there all kinds of claims that the district has been entitled to that we have not been aggressive in trying to recoup uh in the past we brought uh Miss Timon to be able to turn that around and to help us enhance the revenue uh for the district so miss Tim is here to talk to the board about one of the more important claim the Medicaid Claim I'll hand it over to this to thank you well good evening to board uh cabinet Community my colleagues um I am here to talk to you as um Raphael said about Medicaid and um our Illinois State Board of Education claims as well sort of why I'm here what we've done done since I've been here and the plans for structuring our Medicaid and claims programs for the future and I've did a little three-year projection to uh provide to during this meeting okay so one of the main um sort of taboo discussions with Medicaid is um what is school-based Medicaid because most people think of Medicaid coming from federal government and CMS centers for Medicaid and Medicare services but this is specifically about school based medic uh school-based Medicaid Program it is a federal program that is offered to each district in the United States of America each state has various guidelines and policy but the end result is to defay money that school districts spend for uh service providers such as OTS pts are um diverse Learners uh teams a lot of uh providers in that department we receive a reimbursement for providing services to our students um right now it's two main factors that I'm discussing is uh students have to be Medicaid eligible they don't necessarily have to be on Medicaid but they have to be eligible for Medicaid and they have to have a IEP um some of you have may may have heard of Medicaid expansion and I will briefly uh touch on that and it will be more magnified in my last slide U speaking of the goals that I plan for the district okay so um our school district and this is a rough number and the reason I say it's a rough number it is a concrete number at that time when I pulled this number but Medicaid Eligibility can go in and out students can go in and out on a monthly basis um due to CMS eligibility federal government eligibility this has nothing to do with our district but we are to monitor this so that we can and maximize our Medicaid dollars so making sure these numbers and these students are being reached is very important so I brought out the our gened Medicaid eligible eligible students because as I said later I will discuss the importance of that 2,917 population but right now at this moment the district is getting reimbursed for our 709 Medicaid eligible students that have IEPs so we are offering services to all of our students um that need them but as far as the reimbursement piece is that 79 um student count and so um one of the main things we have to align with federal and state guidelines which the district is currently doing um by reporting uh capturing this information using our Medicaid Billing System all that they offer us um so this is very important because state policy changes um very frequently I'll say that right now because the state is in some changing modes since postco with Medicaid um in July 2021 that's when the state um passed the state Amendment plan that allows us to uh submit reimbursements for all students that are Medicaid eligible not just our IEP students so that is great news but as I said I will discuss the stages that we have to pursue that because it's nothing that we can do overnight okay now to transition to our Illinois State Board of Education claims that I personally U work with or collaborate with um with especially with our diverse Learners Department um as Rafael spoke to our transportation claim which is a huge claim for our district and one of the main things that um I've had the opportunity to focus on is making sure that we're capturing everything in that claim and when I say capturing one thing that we hadn't historically called our our students that participate in curriculum based field trips that are Walkers they can still be counted in the claim even though they're a walker because they're on that school bus during that curriculum field trip so I'm working with not only the transportation department but our school secretaries and school leadership to make sure that we are now capturing that to report court for our next claim that is due we were able to capture some but not as much from 2023 2024 school year but the goal is to capture these numbers and develop a system to make sure we're tracking these numbers not only relying on power school but relying on on our staff that in the buildings that can give us those numbers um our nutrition claim is something that is submitted monthly um and then how I work to assist um the department Department our department with diverse Learners is our private placement claims our Ro and room and board claims and our youth and Care claims and those are all for students to have IEPs um and those are mandatory claims that the state requires that we capture uh annually okay so like to briefly discuss implementation just since I've been with the district since January of this year uh one of the main uh takeaways from this is that we transition from my service tracker to embrace DS those are Medicaid billing systems the state of Illinois requires any school district that is participating in Medicaid reimbursement that we have a third-party billing company that does captures our data to submit to Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services and that's how our re where our reimbursements come from so CMS sends those reimbursements to Illinois Department of Health Care and Family Services and then in turn they send us our check from our reimbursement from services that we offer so Embrace DS holds all of that information that we need for billing purposes and we submit to public Consulting Group which is contracted through the state of Illinois that we have to um submit information to um We are continuing to align with inter our internal processes with state and federal policy especially as that changes um staff training I'm going to go more in depth because that's a very important piece of this presentation and then collaboration with the diverse Learners Department that is that department is our bread and butter when it comes to reimbursements so collaboration with that department is intricate to maximize our dollars okay so the importance of Staff training um and doing this work I this is not a a just a job to me this is something that's very important Medicaid school-based Medicaid is extremely important to me not because of the financial piece but because I was a sped teacher I was a TA at some point and I understand the hard work sometimes goes unnoticed but especially financially we sometimes can miss things because we're not collaborating we're not pouring into our staff so one thing thing that I have found extremely important to make sure the staff is properly trained not talking at them but collaborating with them because my job is a partnership not only with Finance but it's a partnership with Transportation with the schools diverse Learners and the students because that's if they're not here and we're not treating them right or doing the right things then it's a null and void so uh properly training staff has been extremely important we've had two large trainings one which are recorded and so instead of like taking people you know and not finding out when people start collaborating with teams to make sure when we have new staff to start during the school year that they have those videos to watch for training purposes um I'm working on developing a newsletter that will go out to um our diverse Learners teams but especially like our slps our OTS pts nursing to update them um monthly on Medicaid training for those to start new starters we have an internal process for up dat I've been meeting with department and then also ource system toing system they can give me a 24 to 4 turn to make those for our state board of education claims implementation that work on is the number one thing I'm proud of is in our in our youth and care I students we had never uh claimed transportation and so Transportation was claimed in this report and it2000 added that theel reports great collaborating again with the learn Department to make sure that um we will claim I um you so this will not be captured from Summer 2023 2024 but this will be captured for this on this current school year to get reimbursed for summertime for esy or summer school for those students and then Ong collaboration with our transportation department and then another thing is reing our district to participate that participate in our to reimburse us for those Services because that is our 10364 um this is going to affect our Academy and this is just basically for Cana it reimb this is in the pipeline so it has been approved as of July 1 has not up to what has been and has approved will this is a positive change for us can get not only from our students but our our students can get reimbursed for services offered through this programy will only frac all right so next steps and this is my last the next steps um to maximize medic doll is I want to focus on this current school year working with the transition from myce making sure all sta train um making sure we students talking students I'm talking students that may expence so they're not but we can Windows Reb Services um to collaborate with transportation department to make only upy and then of6 I just mentioned next for the next scho year U to develop internal procedures to align with Medicaid expansion policy um prepare staff to Medica eligible general education students so it is a preparation this is not something that we going 2026 2027 to really kick off the Medica expansion so our nursing team I've met with them will to soon this schol got it I just want to thank you for coming tonight but how what percentage of Staff does this affect from a professional development standpoint or training standpoint I would say roughly and I'm not going to hold you to that number just a rough not hold to this number but it doesn't even affect all of our okay so we talking abouts Department our so this is not even in our teach can't get reim instruction percent and I could no and that's okay that yeah okay okay I just want to get make sure you give yourself enough time because it seems like a lot of training well will do a lot of the work for us but we focusing now thank you do go ahead I have just just two questions um collect the esy reimbursement from tuition student districts can you just help me understand that a little better [Music] students so they come to esy and we've never asked for those monies yeah because that's in the agreement okay all right and it wasn't in the previous agreement either it just said programs but for a lot of our districts we need to paint it out because we may receive some feedback that they you know that's not necessarily esy you know it's regular term so and the state does have a difference between regular term and and summer to make sure that we aligned and to cover ourselves we made sure we specifically put in the new ig's uh summer school and I just want to also point out since uh mer has been here we've been more aggressive in collecting tuition payment for those out of District students over were here can I can I actually piggy bag that piggy bag piggyback that just for brief history lesson just to make sure that we're all holding our like like collectively uh accountable on that piece like when I came on the board in 2015 like we had this kind of like conversation about how much money was left on the table and and I think again to the community out there we will many times here like um I'm just going to be blunt right we'll hear well why why why do we see us spending more money when it comes to like the administrative side of things and I want to remind the community that when we went through all of those Cuts in 2019 and I know some people get tired of me saying this but I think it's a really important perspective to understand it's not like we didn't have administrators before who knew we weren't really collecting on this stuff when we made those cuts one of the things that was said repeatedly yes I know by myself many times was some of the things we're doing to save money are going to actually cost us money and this is one of those examples right where the the system that we had set up even to us at the time seemed like a lot of duct tape and whatever right like whatever we were getting was like kind of like well this is the best we can do so I think it's really important for us to understand how we got to this point of not collecting what we probably should have been collecting but more importantly even that when we um nurture the system when we give the resources to the system we're actually going to make more money get more money than we are under quote unquote a a cut system the only ask that I have and then I'll be quiet um is it would be nice for us I think to see like um like year by year what we're what we're getting because I think that would hit at home also um because we could sit there and look I don't know how far back you can go but if you can go back pretty far it'd be great because I think the community could honestly see oh boy here's where we we figured out the problem and then we did nothing to to nurture the system until until we did so I'm glad that you brought that up and I mean this is something that I do plan to do is to come back I would for Medicaid purposes because the state is just so far behind we just received a reimbursement from 2021 um over the summer so and not saying that all of the reimbursements are like that like are there are two separate Medicaid a fee per service and an admin and we they sort of roll in but like some of our bigger reimbursements they're behind but I my ask is to have a this full school year to collect and really build those trends for you all and then to come back and present what your ask is for over the few years once we get a full year under our Bel and since we're on an ACR basis we can actually we don't have to wait for the cash right yes once the claims are approved and uh we can book it then and we can actually I've heard use that data of uh approved claim to compare to Prior Years thank you yeah I've brought up oh no go ahead so so the the other um the other question I was going to ask is is that considered revenue or is that offsetting and expense it's actually Revenue okay wow so yeah one of the things that and I've brought this up a few times is not just to look at the incremental Revenue that we're getting you know from from these types of activities but um some of the things that grants you know um I'd like to see kind of the accumulation of that um over time just to see kind of the incremental amount that we're getting um so that was my only that was the second question just to just to to respond to that when uh we requested positions in the in the finance office we specifically requested what we term profit Center positions those are positioned that we generate revenue for the district and uh our we will determine whether we've been successful in doing that is to actually track those revenues and we intend which is the reason why we are di merited come present tonight and we also intend to have a comeback a year from now and we can see a comparison of what we're getting in Revenue before she started and a year after she started what we we're getting the revenue and we intend to do that we Al we we have a we actually have a presentation teed up about fees too we hired a fee specialist too for the first time and we are going to do the same thing the revenue that we were getting before fee specialist and the revenue that we'll be getting a year after the fee specialist was high so we intend to do that to show where it's been uh for lack of better work where has been a good use of resources to all this folks in house yeah go ahead I just real quick I just wanted to say thank you um obviously since You' started it's made a difference of a few hundred, and certainly funds that we can use and we can redeploy to other places and funds that we're entitled to so um again thank you and we hope to see more it nice meeting you so when you said 2021 we just received some funds is it a matter of like the squeaky will getting the oil in terms of communicating with the state or it just coming when it comes no that's just how it comes and so um not to like go there but as of last week I was asked to sit on a council for the state to discuss these challenges so it's called the P20 uh Council and I've been asked to represent um some districts to discuss not only for Medicaid purposes is but why our reimbursements are so stagnant and how it directly affects school districts when we're waiting for money that we know we have but we don't tangibly have them and how it can really affect the growth of a district when we're waiting for funds thank you okay all right great thank you so much I just want to underscore one thing before we close out just to say thank you both for your attention to the details that I don't think many have been able to really pull together but also the way in which you work through the system your collaboration I've heard from lots of individuals who've had opportunity to meet you um your your commitment to the core values of humanization um empathy dignity while figuring out that we need to be more honest about our collection so I want to thank you for that that effort and really helping change the culture of our district to you and Mr Obi for how you've done this so thank you so much thank you so much thank you having me thank you really as we did last year with evidence-based funding bring really some opportunity to learn around how we are thinking about foundational practices in our district what are those three foundational practices and uh really provide some short educational information to the community as we did last year with evidence based funding this year we're really focusing on our more of our academic and uh social emotional learning priorities right good even good evening hi everyone um so I am excited to present to you some information on behalf of IAD so this is a collaborative effort with Dr can you sorry would say what is I lead just so those so I lead stands for innovation learning Equity advocacy and diversity and based on our consistent collaboration we came up with an idea of how we can just reference ourselves because of the collaboration that we are involved in on a daily basis so Dr Paul is our assistant superintendent of learning and Innovation Dr Waller is our assistant superintendent of equity and Ral presence and I am your assistant superintendent of diverse Learners so this again is a collaborative effort to show show some how how we have quantitative and qualitative data to support the academic social and behavioral domains of our students we are also having an opportunity to scoop up Jeremy Bell this evening to talk a little bit in with us about um some of those student services pieces before you get started can I make one suggestion maybe on this slide or even all the slides until I lead becomes like so common sense and in our district can you just add it in the bottom so we can see it over and over and over thank you absolutely love that idea somebody asked me the other day and I'm like I don't know but it's good AC and we actually were purposeful too using the lowercase ey because we wanted to say others before ourselves see if you could just put it in the bottom can see it absolutely great idea absolutely thank you so there are five Big Ideas we want to go over through tonight reinforce how critical it is um that we align our work with the find foundational practices they really are a driver to what we're trying to do every single day for our students we're going to talk about oural Universal screener called Panorama we're going to talk about the Benchmark and progress monitoring tools those are called fastbridge and star 360 we'll discuss a bit about power school and how we use that database system for our behavioral incidents and then we're going to make some connections to the mtss in five Essentials so as alluded to a minute ago we really want to emphasize the criticalness of our foundational practices and how this shared vision of what we stand for drives the quantitative and qualitative data that assist us that help us make an informed decision so looking at the quantitative and qualitative information that we have we went ahead and desegregate how that impacts and informs us when it comes to students academic social and behavioral domains so as you can see Panorama does per provide us some important information when it comes to the behavior and needs of our students academic is where we tap into fast bridge and stars and we'll talk about that in a minute some of the reporting tools that we have are power school and our state reporting tool one of our state reporting tool five Essentials and then something that encompasses all three academic behavior and social emotional is mtss and also five Essentials so as youve heard before about panorama being oural Universal screener for our students grades 3 through 12 um we know this data is going to give us some really good input on our students uh social emotional learning competencies as well as give us some information about the health of the core uh this year um in kindergarten through grade eight you might remember we are implementing our character strong curriculum where we're explicitly teaching social emotional learning in our classrooms and this data from the Panorama survey will help inform our continu pedagogy and practices in the classroom um in addition we're going to be using these key data points to help inform some additional wonderings we had um we engaged our students um and asked them using five Essentials data help us learn a little bit more about what you mean about safety and we with our students co-wrote some short answer questions that we included in the Panorama survey about psychological safety and belonging because we felt that the five Essentials data left us Wonder ing about how we can continue to support them in the classroom on a continual basis next we're going to learn more about our benchmark assessments so our Benchmark fastbridge is currently um assessed three times throughout the school year fall winter and spring for students in grades 1 through nine the content of the assessment is in ela and math and fastbridge is standard Norm reference and Criterion so what does that mean standardize means it is aligned to Common Core State Standards Norm references refers to how we get information on how the students are performing at a national level among their peers and Criterion base gives us information about the particular skills that are being assessed with our students this year we're piloting star 360 Star 360 is another Benchmark assessment and the reason why we're piloting it is because we can p we can assess students in Spanish fastbridge does not provide us an assessment in Spanish and we have students in our dual language program who are instructed in Spanish but we had no way to assess them in Spanish so star 360 allows us to assess students in language arts in English language arts in Spanish math in English math in Spanish it's in grades 1 through eight and you'll notice the difference to reason why it's in grades 1 through eight and start 360 as opposed to 1-9 and fast bridge is because our dual language program goes to the eighth grade it has the exact same um assessment formats as it does fast bridge and the same testing Windows both assessments provide us progress monitoring uh progress monitoring tools just to be clear then prior to this we were not providing a benchmark assessment in our in students native language in Spanish in this District we had no standard no benchmark assessments correct in Spanish and yet students were being instructed in Spanish and we've fought for it for years we've like this doesn't make any sense and it's something that has been very important so it's wonderful to see I just have a question though is this is fastbridge and star 360 or I just really want to focus on fastbridge is this the so the state assesses and then this is our version of assessment this helps us in our district is this the what we want to do or is there other um things out there that we could use instead because I I just have heard POS pros and cons about it and I just wondered if this is just we're continuing what we're doing or you really feel this is the one for us so we also have the same wondering we're in the process of putting together a survey to survey our teachers because we have been hearing the same um in addition to what Dr duel has shared as well um wanting to have an assessment that's equitable for all of our students and right now we're currently doing two um so we are wondering the same thing and we hope to give you an update here in the future excellent thank you I have a question yes of course um for fast bridge is this is this targeted okay so you said that this is for you to have like a mark about like how students are doing in their classes however is this like directly related to their placement the next school year because my brother and I hate to bring this up but like he's like a straight A stud but he's really bad test taker so after he took his fast bridge on in sixth grade he wasn't allowed to be placed into honors classes next year even though his grades were at the Mark that it needed to be but his fast Bridge was not the best score so is it for you guys just to monitor our progress or is it also used for teachers to make a criteria for the next school year so that's a great question that's also under review you're talking about at the junior high level accelerated placement right and what data points they use and I think you're bringing up an excellent point that you can do well in class but maybe not do as well as an assessment so we're reviewing our protocol for how we're placing students and wanting to give more opportunities for all students so thank you for sharing that story you're highlighting the same thing that we're wanting to address as well yeah and I'll just add one of the things we're working really hard to emphasize is that a benchmark or one timee assessment doesn't give us it gives us solely a snapshot of a student it does not represent a student progress or achievement so we aim for a diverse group of Assessments grades formative assessments summative assessments Benchmark standardized testing right all of those really inform us how you what you need and how you perform as a student so we know that there's going to be some opportunities for us to really hone in on that well and I think teacher input is also something that's very important I love that you I cannot tell you how amazing that is that you brought that up because this something that is being talked about there are parents who get very frustrated for that exact reason it's like my kid is so bored in a standard class and really needs to be in an accelerated class but because their assessments aren't where they need to be they may or may not be so you literally just nailed right honed right in on something that they are really they know is a is a challenge that we need to figure out and and my my suspicion is is that no matter what assessment we find it's not going to be as you said it's still going to be a snapshot so my my challenge would be um based on the scenario that she gave a decision was still made based on the snapshot so what what else can we do excuse me to ensure that students are not being um profile based on that snapshot but they still are and not giv access to opportuni that they that they can have so what other criteria and I'm not asking you to answer it today but when we're making a decision if we're saying it's not solely based on the assessment but it's actually impacting uh students based on the assessment what else can we do to build that profile to ensure that that's not the case I want to say I agree with everything whatever our student board member I think really just highlighted a lived experience and I don't know if Eugene is referencing lived experience maybe with uh his children as well or all of us maybe have sensed that in some way uh and Dr duel like I think we're in complete agreement that we need something that's more holistic in regard to determining what classes students should take and when and for me it's always seemed the the the block is just how to how do you how do you make that actionable like how do we how do we put that into action uh because the fall back is always we have this you know the fallback is always the test or or or this test I have one other clarifying question on Star 360 because I you know Dr katti highlighted this is the first time sounds like that we're testing our students um in Spanish if they're being instructed in Spanish uh but our dual language students are intended to be dual language so when and some of them are not from native Spanish speaking homes and so do they at some point during that time also get a snapshot of how their English skills are moving forward so star 360 there's four parts tost so they're assessed in English and in Spanish for language arts and math so they're taking language arts assessment in English and language it's a dual language assessment yes it's you can call it a dual language assessment yes thank you so kind of guys were all talking about is triangulation of data we can't just use a snapshot another indicator that we look at when we look at just kind of the whole student is those identifi Behavior identifiable behavioral incidents um Power School as we shifted last year to that sis system required a great deal of training for our administrators to understand how to input data this is critical for our state and federal reporting it's also critical for us to be able to identify and analyze those early warning indicators all right around Behavior and so as you can see on the screen um that is the tool that we use in terms of putting in I say a teacher managed or a classroom managed behavior and an office managed Behavior kind of two different levels right that teacher man managed behavior is that tier one kind of tier two um uh indicator that we want to make sure we're documenting but doesn't necessarily Elevate to removing a student or having a conversation in the office those are things that teachers can still uh proactively have parent conferences for student conferen and those types of things you can see on the bottom then collaborative supports and ways that we support that lower level behavior and higher level Behavior with our character strong seal curriculum that we've implemented this year our school social workers our counselors those conferences small group intervention and then a higher level student support or safety plan for that individualized support as you heard uh last year we embarked on um a collaborative effort in creating co-creating a multi multi-tiered systems of support or as we call it mtss in our system um we really focused on the whole child in this framework and looking at the social emotional learning the academic and the behavioral components of our students and wanting to create a Common Language about what we mean about being proactive and preventative uh this is a framework that we are introducing to our system this year and providing professional development as we continue to collaborate together and supporting um our Learners in and out of the classroom um again focused on what that tier one differentiated core looks like how we can support all of our Learners in all areas of academic success and social emotional learning and behavioral success and then really evaluating as a system when we see that our Learners are um not making it expected growth how can we evaluate using a framework we are introducing to our system called the iso framework so we're focusing on really kind of evaluating what does the instruction look like have we been really explicit about teaching our Learners about social emotional success behavioral success or academic success if we can't say the answer is yes what do we need to to do in the classroom to improve our instruction uh the same thing goes for curriculum how can we evaluate our curriculum on a continual basis where adjustments do we need to make um as well as environmental where do we need to adjust environment um both in and out of the classroom to help our students feel that Psych iCal safety and a sense of belonging and then ultimately what are we doing to support our Learners so this framework and way of thinking is a shift in our system um where we're looking at really kind of pausing and reflecting to make sure that we're asking the right questions as we look at how we can continue to support our students in all three of those areas um in addition you heard mentioned five essential survey data um we know that this data is very informative for our schools as well as our school district um this is administered in grades 4 through 12 and really the purpose is really for us to be able to identify our areas of strength and areas of growth you can see the five areas Illustrated on the screen and as I mentioned before we use one of the data sets from supportive environment to help inform additional questions we asked in the Panorama uh Universal screener um in addition this decision-making has been very informative for our schools as they work on creating School Improvement plans this year using our three foundational practices of Highly Effective systems and teams equity and rightful presence and high quality instruction we have come alongside of our buildings as they continue to identify culturally responsive high quality instructional practices as they work with um students and their families and using that data to help inform our work so I will wrap it up with um reiterating actually some of the comments made you know it is absolutely necessary that our students are embraced holistically that they recognize that they can Thrive and I don't think that that could happen without foundational practices these practices are really necessary if we're going to have that shift to understand that a snapshot is not enough then we need those effective systems and teams we need groups of people to collaborate and work together we need to have high quality instruction not have lower expectations that only intends to perpetuate in equity that does and allow for the rightful presence um so knowing that these foundational practices do Drive our work and a lot of the conversations that are going to happened that have happened and will happen so that we can Embrace and support our students in their whole Child Learning and really help them be contributing members of society so any questions I have I just want to uplift a conversation that we had at the committee meeting when we had a chance to preview this uh presentation thank you for this I think it's really important to understand what we have access to in regards to you know where our students are at academically socially Etc and I appreciate that it's connected to these foundational um feces um when I think about the benchmark assessments and the progress monitoring for um you know like in regards to fast bridge and star 360 it seems pretty comprehensive I think we're working on figuring out if the right if it's the right thing right uh but when I think about the high school there's always seems to be a a a gap there in regards to assessing formatively where our students are at throughout the year um one of the things and we get like act data right like or SATs and upcoming act data or pre satat preat data um and so one of the things we discussed at our committee meeting uh so the rest of the board can hear is maybe turning towards uh monitoring um class grades or course grades so we can get a snapshot of how they're doing how students are doing in a variety of courses in a variety of areas throughout the year um and then we also highlighted too for those of us who have recently had students apply to colleges um and things like that often time the SAT or ACT score is not you don't have to submit it anymore and it's really that um GPA that is getting them access to certain programs admission in general scholarships Etc so uh I know we just had our meeting this week but I wanted to uplift that conversation see if you all wanted to add to that and then one other thing I excuse me one other thing to add to what Dr Mido said was the ability to then be able to triangulate that data um not only from the grades but also to student services and to the whole student um so that the the great so that that data can tell a story about a student on maybe some earlier interventions that um could be possible because we understand the correlation between perhaps some Behavior years perhaps their grades Etc but I'll let you guys yeah excellent points um one of the things that we're um introducing to our system is something called Data days at our elementary schools this is a very familiar practice but for our secondary schools this is a little unknown um so we're starting this practice um we did something with our principles last week called a reality check uh where we had a chance to kind of go a little bit deeper um looking at some of our uh soon to be actually already is released our school report data um so that we can kind of go a little bit deeper and identify areas of growth for our schools um but areas that we need to continue to support we looked at demographic data um we looked at Chronic absenteeism so just exactly like you said Eugene we're looking at multiple data points and we're starting to familiarize and build the capacity of our principles so that we can continue to have these really powerful moments using the data sets that we have in front of us um in addition learning Innovation as we work with our uh content area teams and writing curriculum a common summi of Assessments and common formative assessments is something that our system is learning about the power of how that can help inform form instruction like I was mentioning earlier make pivots and changes instructionally as well as our curriculum adjust our environment and support our Learners overall so um thank you again for lifting the parts of our conversation last week we are definitely on a journey together all right I just I just have a I think it's a comment I don't know if it's a statement a comment a question but to what Dr dubiel said the importance of foundational practices I think for the veteran board members and I know that um the newer board members would agree for a long time decision- making was really hard because we didn't have kind of that North Star and so for this now I feel like decision- making is easier around our foundational practices I hope you feel that way from an administrative perspective I know I feel that way as a board member one of the things that I love about I lead and I know this is a huge huge like step like to think about but we have always had an abundance of data that I don't think has ever been the issue it's what we do with the data and so having the collaboration that you've put together I hope that and I don't think it's going to be some I don't think it's going to be soon um I think that you're still trying to figure out what I lead looks like and collaborating a journey like you said but having all of the parts be able to look at the data data so that you can pull back and kind of look at that 30,000 foot view if we have high instructional quality um Quality instruction but equity and rifal presence is here and we see the imbalance then we know that we're not doing something right so I just look forward to in the future taking our the the data that Jeremy's provided with us with you know the behavioral assessments and taking this assessment that assessment but really I think for the board seeing that 30,000 foot view um I know you have to get into the weeds and stuff which is less our role but um I look forward to that and I feel like that will help the board make better holistic decisions versus just these like Silo decisions um in the future so thank you for really kind of pulling this all together for for me tonight anyone else I just want to just say something about data in general like I mean we we want to be a culture where data is is really an important aspect of how we make decisions um we also want to make sure that the outcome data that we're looking at is not one in which perpetuates a deficit narrative about students and who our students are and what they bring to the table and so we we have to make sure our community understands that um the problem of often times is not with the student but it's with the systems around that data and so making sure that when we're communicating out that we're not getting uh we're our community is not looking at our students as the problem thank you but I think that's kind of to your point what having our foundational practices does because before and I'm not pointing fingers at the board but we were all like maybe my foundational practice was this and maybe yours was that and maybe yours was that so we were all looking through our own lens and now we've said we agree as a whole that these are the things we're going to look at so if one of them's out of balance we know what to dive in after and not keep kind of chasing the fish in the barrel right so I I just I don't know I just had a huge aha moment tonight so thank you and I was going to exactly reiterate what you just said to transition from the deficit view to an acid viewing of our students we need to look at students holistically and that's really challenging to do when we operate in silos and one of the things that are our practices that wasn't an easy shift and we continue to build upon is we cross collaborate and we cross-pollinate all the time so our teams come together hence I lead all the time that's non-negotiable for us very very good yes let's give him a round of applause [Applause] I I would like to underscore as we transition to invite Mr Bell to speak to our safety presentation um 5.3 but before we close I think I have to speak one thing which is that what you're seeing in these foundational practices are not picked out of the sky they're the function of a diagnosis work that we took last year in building our strategic road map there what you're hearing tonight both here board and Community is there result of really diagnosing the system and identifying these the curriculum audit we heard a presentation about affirmed that this was the direction we were going the right direction and said number one you need to plan who plans is it going to be the administration and the teachers over here is it the board with its vision of clarity about what it wants which it's conveyed through the equity policy no these things come together then in moving and building then a part partnership with our Educators with all staff and the community in building what I would call the next stage of this process which is a strategic plan the Strategic so the purpose of the current state of things is so that we can start to move on laying Foundation it's kind of like you know you got to get here you know you got to do some work to get there but if you haven't tilled the ground in that process if you haven't started to clear the air you haven't started to prepare things I'm terrible analogy so I apologize but if you haven't prepared the road and identifi what roadblocks you're going to run into which is what our road map was about you're going to just keep running you can say oh I want to get there but you have no idea what's in front of you and so I want to thank our our partners our Union Partners um um our Educators our community members who invested a lot of time last year in our superintendent Advisory Group board member for your vision all of these are what has led to these three foundational practices which is going to stop the opportunity Gap that we're seeing where a student the barriers to student academic opportunities are limited because of choices that people haven't been empowered to make frankly it's not anybody's fault the system hasn't empowered people to make decisions that are allowing those and so we are going to shift that and I'm I'm confident about it's getting there so all that to say stay tuned everybody we have strategic planning opportunities coming up please pay attention uh look out for opportunities to join in this work this is not going to be done by the people alone in this room this is going to be really the result of a CommunityWide effort everybody from the mayor of iGo to the mayor of Aurora down to our bus drivers to our our Police Department all are going to be part of this process and we want to thank you in advance for your investment of completing either whether it's a survey joining a meeting joining a focus group and or talking to students as part of this process so did thank told our community I sure did I better see you no but I'm glad you brought up the supervisor attendant group because don't you feel that anecdotally we heard all these things exct and this is like the exclamation point Thank you thank you 5.3 I want to welcome uh our assistant superintendent of student services Mr Bell uh who will also uh introduce his uh Dynamic team who've joined him this evening and I want to thank you um for joining us team in this presentation for our annual safety update uh Camille is also in the back just so you don't forget her she's the glue behind it all right yes so I'm gonna I'm G to try and do it not as much talking and let my team talk because thank good they you set yourself Mr B set yourself up for that um but I'm going to introduce my team um and uh just want to say again uh thank you for letting us do this um this is something we do annually um and so we provide an annual safety and security update to the board um I'm not sure what is uh we provide an annual safety and security update to the board um there's there's uh critical aspects of this and and we just heard a lot about data that's one of the ways in which we inform ourselves and inform our system um about the volume um and the things that it takes to keep a large um system running um and and so with that I'm going to introduce my team and then I will stop talking Miss Johnson uh my name is Jeremy bam assistant superintendent of student services I'd like to introduce bayy Campbell our director of student services for special programs Michelle Pete our director of student services for secondary Michael Johnson our director of student services for elementary and Mike frers our coordinator of School Safety and Security and last but not least Camille Simmons who is sitting in the office uh the executive assistant um for student services and she makes sure that we all stay on our toes with that I'll give the clicker to you all right thank you for the introductions and thank you board of education for having us tonight for our annual safety and security update uh before we get into the heart of our Department's work we want to align closer oh thank you we want to align our work and the District's three foundational practices as we just heard um starting with effective systems and teams so it is crucial that we Implement effective safety protocols and support systems to ensure that both our students and staff have the resources they need um moving on to high quality instruction we know that high quality instruction is only able to flourish in spaces that are both psychologically and physically safe for our students and then last but not least equity and a sense of rightful presence this is critical for cultivating an inclusive environment that emphasizes again again that psychological and phys physically safe spaces um fostering a strong sense of belonging for all of our students all right well this presentation is mainly to highlight um the Safety and secur Security side of our department we want to also just highlight um all of the buckets in which uh student services is responsible for starting with our Central Registration Department helping all of our families um efficiently register make sure that they have access to the supports and resources they need supportive environment this really encompasses both the proactive and reactive sides of our department this includes things like rights and responsibilities and call to action which we'll touch on a little bit later and then of course the Safety and Security so a lot of the work that you're going to see in this presentation is really based on some of the efforts that we've been building for the past two years uh so looking back to that twoe window some of those projects that we've looked to implement in that first year in 2022 were the uh increased use of cameras in our elementary buildings uh we were continuing to update our emergency response plan we rolled out our uh first version of our comprehensive threat assessment uh process which is how we evaluate potential threats to a building uh we created a framework to that and then pushed it out to the buildings for them to use initially uh we did quite a bit of training that first year both in Alice and on basic investigations and really a lot of the work that we've been building is creating Frameworks for our administrators to use so there's consistency and continuity across the district um looking to this past year we continued some of those efforts with uh increasing our footprint in visitor management uh we updated the call boxes at all of our facilities we move those call boxes or the doorbell cameras outside of the front door securing the front door to our facilities we built on that Foundation of that thread assessment model uh and created a a guide book for our staff to use uh really a Bible that they can reference uh a bulk of the work done by Bailey just a phenomenal uh lift for her and uh all all of our team was trained as well in the Train the trainer model so that year we rolled out training across the district so we could have uh administrators trained in our process you'll see some of the results of that um we continued training in our again our emergency response protocols and our standard response protocol um and work collaborative with a bunch of different entities but particularly last year with our regional Office of Education here in Kendall Grandy worked closely with them uh participated in a Safety Committee that they had formed uh and did some joint training with them as well to get maintain consistency across the district and within the region on the um incident response and supportive environment side we want to highlight the work that was done interdepartmentally with the call to action this is really driven by the work the board of education did and pass uh passing the equity policy um and creating that document that we collectively use to respond to um incidents of bullying harassment racism discriminatory language and hateful Acts and then the incident reporting mechanisms and structures really just highlighting um the streamlined approach for our buildings to utilize when investigating things around bullying and harassment threat assessment um and looking at um exclusionary discipline as well supportive environment data sets this was really a huge lift for our department as well creating an internal system that we use to monitor things such as security alerts 911 calls fire and EMS response calls um any classroom relocations we also look uh this year we added Handle With Care notifications um and those security alerts and incident tip lines as well and then last but not least we just want to highlight that um some additional work that we did in collaboration with the diverse Learners Department was updated risk of harm administrative procedure which we'll go into in a little bit more detail as well okay now we're going to provide you with some sets of data to highlight and articulate aspects of the Safety and Security work that's going on within our district so when we look at police service calls we see that there are a total of 142 from last year um police calls are those calls that are connected to our buildings based on where they are located um these calls can happen at any time including during the school day before school after school and on weekends these calls are not always indicative of an emergency 911 call from the school building so for example if we look up here we'll see that Fox Chase has uh 37 calls um many of these calls can likely be attributed to calls that were made about incidents that occurred in the Park District space which is located next to the school building okay so in the this set of data reflects the same information but at our secondary levels um and you'll see similar to the previous slide there's kind of a some information that jumps out at you one of the the high schools has significantly more calls for service than the other um diving deep into that information and speaking to the understanding the numbers behind them and what it means in working closely with uh swel police it really came down to individual data entry so how an SRO put the data into the system in one building was different than how it was at the other high school so the end result result was that we didn't have a true Apples to Apples comparison of overall incidents at the end of the year um realistically the number really is about the same but just looks differently on paper only in terms of coding and then how it's reflected in the the data reporting so now we'll talk about our fire and EMS calls um fire and EMS calls are indicative of a non call they can occur for a variety of reasons and this can include a trip of false alarm a mental health crisis or issue a medical emergency it can also be generated to receive support from our First Responders so if we look at this uh page right here last year's numbers indicated that elementary schools generated a combined total of 37 fire and EMS calls so um high schools last year their numbers generated a combination of a total of 69 fire calls and EMS calls one of the things we really want to emphasize is that we do not call first respondents to address all of the needs in our buildings we have a lot of other strategies and supports that we put in place to address those issu this slide takes a look at our supportive environment data so as Bailey referenced previously in addition to that Safety and Security bucket we also collect data within that supportive environment realm so the first bucket up there is our office managed Behavior incidents those are any incidents that may come initially from a classroom or office but those are incidents that are then handled through our office to offer that additional support we also support and guide the investigation process when we collaborate with our building level teams and their leaders we also have a public facing tip line where we encourage people to see something say something so that's another bucket and then we also track our security alerts these alerts go through our building Administration and we work with them to support our students in various areas we could get alerts because of self harm depression or notify us of any potential threats that would prompt us to respond and support one of the things I want to highlight here on this slide is um the significant partnership with ASO police department and so we started some of this work in 2223 um and carried on into 2324 and Sergeant naring is here and and representing that I want to call him out in particular because he was critical on the police side for helping to understand the negative impacts of citing our kids in our schools regardless of whether or not um legislation caught up to what we wanted to do um and so I could not uh have engaged in any of that work without him on the police side um and so that's it's a tremendous lift and I appreciate that thank you very much thank you yes thank you this data in particular highlights that reduction of ordinance violations among our students in partnership with the police department it showcases the effectiveness of proactive community policing initiatives and the restorative practices approach in 20223 we had 105 tickets that were issued for students that engaged in vaping and 52 stick 52 ordinance violations for students that um met the criteria for disorderly conduct you can see that those numbers plummeted drastically um in the in the following year and some of that had to do with the interventions that were set up not only in the school but outside of the school for any of those students that were repeat offenders or that recidivism rate um there's a an asteris up there that specifically identifies anytime a student that is uh May re repeats a behavior of vaping has an opportunity to attend a class um with a uh thirdparty provider um that is trained in substance abuse and use um uh to be able to kind of offset any fines or ordinance violations that that student or family may incur incur um and so those 16 are representative of either kids that chose not to participate in that class or um uh or failed to attend once they had had signed up then an ordinance violation goes into place for that okay on this next slide I just want to take a moment to appreciate the essential support that our building leaders give to our schools each and every day so you'll see just a glimpse of approximately how many incidents occur each day um it definitely fluctuates day to day but it's important to just understand the support and how we have to lift and support and be a part of those situations each day whether it's from that safety security or supportive L and then on this slide we wanted to just provide you with some Trend data for the first six week Benchmark so you can compare last year to this year you'll notice that this year we've had um eight we dropped by 100 incidents for office managed incidents When comparing to last year um the other buckets and information on this slide just contain that data as it relates to those different supportive environment data sets that we track I want to highlight can you go back to that one one second these are not things that we monitored and track these are things that may have existed in our system when we talk about data sets understanding the data and then looking at the impact of that data and how that informs and drives us the the addition of the the folks that you see in front of us have allowed Us Now to create those mechanis isms to collect healthy data right dirty data equals you know garbage in garbage out kind of thing right um and so the ability now to look at security alerts understand Trend data for the first six weeks from last year to this year office managed Behavior referrals from last year to this year the fact that we can put this information in font of buildings and building leaders and building leadership teams to say we are making progress here what does that look like what are you doing how is that aligning T School Improvement plans and ultimately those three foundational practices so some of the other things that our team works on extensively the emergency response plan for the district we have a extensive and comprehensive emergency response plan that approaches it from an all hazards perspective so we give guidance to the buildings on how to respond in a critical emergency situation um that is what I would refer to as a living document we sit down I sit down with building leaders at the beginning of the school year uh we review their individual safety plan in the building we update it so that it's current uh and then we close out the year with a collective meeting where all of our building leaders come together Our Community Partners in public safety come in uh the police department Fire Department EMS Emergency Management we open up our plan to them and we take their feedback um we roll those changes and updates into the next year's plan so that start of the school year we're ready to go um one of our big projects right now at the beginning of the school year is our life health safety walks so we myself uh assistant director Shaun AI work with the regional Office of Education the local fire inspector and we inspect each one of our facilities across the district to ensure that it's safe and co- compliant uh currently where we're at in that is really in the beginning phases we're about a little over 10% of our buildings have been inspected thus far we do it uh based on all of our schedules when we can get to each building uh the emergency plan gives us the foundation the standard response protocol we extract out of there and it gives us that outline that we can give to our staff in a small bullet point form um so that all of our staff understand that standard response protocol and those actions that they can take to be safe with the staff and students in an emergency situation all of our Protocols are uh reflect what the drills and the law requires us to do so you can see here the state law requires us to do so many drills we in 308 exceed that in several areas but all of those drills are purposeful so that we're looking to evaluate and understand do our buildings know how to react in a given situation and are those common terms being reflected in those operations and then just a quick highlight on Fred assessment as Mike mentioned during the 2324 school year the districts and services team became train the trainers we then pushed that training out to uh 74 building based team members equating to a building threat assessment team at all of our sites um we use the seag model the comprehensive school threat assessment guidelines model which we are looking to train 76 additional team members this fall um once a thre assessment is kind of initiated at the building level it really just reacts um or triggers that coordinated response between the district level and the building level um where we obviously are going to prioritize the safety of all of those involved both physically and psychologically and then really coaching and guiding our teams um through that evaluation the response the planning and the monitoring of that threat assessment when we pushed out this training we were um able to successfully train everyone in the beginning of November so once we pushed out that training and really tried to start tracking some of our threat assessment data within the building this will just kind of show you that Trends data from November through the end of the school year which equates to 81 total threat assessments the SE stag model has us um classify our threats into three different areas transient serious and very serious so you'll see here that a majority of our threat assessments for the previous school year 65 to be exact were able to be um classified as transient um based on the utilization of that c stag model I want to highlight one thing on this a threat assessment that's conducted for a student does not equate or equal discipline we want to make sure that when we're looking at that whole student we understand whether there's a mental health component whether there's a social emotional need um whether there's uh some deficit areas that need to that we need to support through a variety of our systems mtss safety plans support plans counselor contact social work contact just an additional check in and check out with that student it does not equal or equate to discipline and that's the basis for the seag model is to understand what you're working with the threat assess that level now move on to the supportive plan and the last aspect of our work that we want to highlight is the work our department does to support board policy 7 colon 290 around um suicide and depression awareness and prevention um so in collaboration as I mentioned earlier with our diverse Learners uh Team we went ahead and updated the administrative procedure um retrained or trained for the first time if they were new to us all of our school psychologists social workers counselors assistant principles and principles at the onset of the school year um and we just want to really um highlight our partnership with referral GPS who supports Us in this work um as it is a wonderful resource that we've been using for several years um to Implement our Columbia which is our suicidality screener um and really allows us to streamline and better support our families and students during the risk of harm process so we want to talk a little bit about future Focus we've kind of bucketed these uh future Focus items in terms of a facilities and management uh or facility management uh components you can see that as rapael has talked about and Bill um from the operations Department looking at a Master's facilities plan um that would include uh security um Audits and those types of things um and so we really need to look at that kind of standardizing that needs assessment for security improvements across all of our buildings that is part of that comprehensive uh approach camera utilization um Mike referenced you know even dating back a few years ago that some of our buildings didn't have Equitable cameras um to all to similar level buildings um and so we worked really hard on that we want to continue to improve that uh infrastructure whether that's refresh whether that's new or understanding what the warranty Cycles are on our cameras okay um and then that conducts it uh regular safety audits um with stakeholder input from improvements I talked a little bit about um a stakeholder Dr katti talked about Partnerships with our Union Partners one of the things that we want that we think is critical anytime we're looking at Safety and Security and supportive environment is collaborating with our Union Partners through that committee work through that work group to be able to help um understand what needs they're seeing at the building in the classroom and what is that look like for us at the district level to be able to support that work to keep all of our kids and our staff physically and psychologically safe when we look at professional development and planning we need to understand what are the needs of our system who needs to be trained in what what are the uh the areas of focus um whether that comes in active visitor management we talked a little bit about standard response protocols that means not just putting things in place and doing a drill but it means allowing for a space where Educators can talk about things that are going to happen in their classroom at some point in time if you have a student that comes in um that is recently on crutches how do we respond to that um in the in the event that there's an ALICE uh an ALICE situation right that teacher may not have thought about that because that student doesn't come in every single day um presenting in that same way and so allowing for those tabletop opportunities to be proactive before that occurs will make that that staff member feel much more proficient in how to respond um implementing restorative practices this is something on the heels of call to action and understanding how we respond to hateful language through our investigatory practice how do we prioritize safety for the individual not only the person that was the victim but also the person that may have used that type of uh behavior in order to cut deep or to get reaction right to cause harm to someone else further investigate those standard response uh srps standard response principles for common language um Mike's work with the roe has attempted to standardize some of that language across the county because if something does happen we're going to get First Responders from everywhere that are going to come to respond and likewise our First Responders are going to go to the next District over and help to respond in the in a uh in an effort if there's a need there um we wanted to look at implementation of badging badging protocol this is something that's low cost low risk and just standardizes the fact that you know who's in your building at all times if I'm walking down the hallway it doesn't matter what my title is or what I'm dressed like if you can't see my badge then I expect that someone is stopping and asking hey how can I help you and you are and what do you need can I assist you in getting there we can't do that if we're not all buying into the same kind of concept of visible ID badges that are present for all of our staff we don't want adults walking into our buildings with kids or without kids in different spaces without indication or without that identification these are these are things that we can Implement straight away okay is that it last slide all right I get to say last slide that was the last slide that seems definitely like it's a lwh hanging fruit I mean ID badge protocol something that I hope we can do future but sooner than future yeah we wanted to bucket things in immediate kind of response kind of a midterm and a longterm kind of strategy there just simple things always keeping that classroom door closed and locked you know yes it's not always convenient for kids that need to use the restroom especially even our Littles at the elementary that are kind of in and out working with a speech pathologist and some of those other pieces but we know from the research that suggest a closed classroom a closed and locked classroom door is is absolutely one of the best mitigating strategies for preventing entry and I can you talking about time can you just touch really Upon Time and about how um just we've had this conversation you know before that everything that you're doing and that you implement is in order to give your staff time sure to have a response um I I feel like um and I'm sorry I just totally jumped in and like in front of my board members first and foremost thank you um the you carry this entire District on your back and we know how hard you work so from the bottom of my heart and all of our hearts thank you but I think um it's very important for the community to know especially when there is when we are in a crisis you know there's always like well why haven't been we been notified why haven't we been doing this this team is working so hard behind the scenes to Pro put the protocol in place to give your staff time to react to whatever you know might happen so I just think that's really important that we continue to reiterate whenever we have the opportunity and you have the microphone in front of you to say what is going on behind the scenes is critical to the safety of our students and our staff so if you can just touch a little bit upon that about everything that you're doing and what's going on behind the scenes when people don't realize well why haven't we gotten an email I haven't you know my my kid texted me and isn't the school district sent it's like you have no idea literally what's going you're talking about in the moment right in the moment you're talking about in the moment yes when when something happens yeah so there's a couple of different things we look at and you know uh the addition of of uh Mike frers has been critical in just kind of even working through some of these things um and and I don't want to speak for you Mike but one of the many of the conversations we have is in the moment if someone is trying to do something harm the best thing we can do is slow them down and so whether that's a classroom door that's locked whether that's a call box on the front whether that's utilizing um the the vestibules right and not allowing them to gain entry in any way shape or form um as as as slow as possible it gives our First Responders an opportunity to respond and to react and to come to that Aid um but we know um just research will tell you there is a particular amount of time that it takes right for the calvary to come um and so we want to make sure that whatever we're doing within our space is just an effort to slow them down at every step whether that's uh a call box a window a locked door um anything that we can do just to kind of delay that inevitable right is always going to be the best kind of thing in the moment you reference communication one of the things that in working with uh Teresa uh commus in the in the Communications Department uh we have continued to try and um understand how we can communicate effective and efficient information without impacting the investigatory process the threat assessment process and still being attentive to the needs of our kid our kids and our community um and our staff um we've learned some things based on things that have happened over the years about how critical communication is and and one of the things we've tried to task ourselves with is being more um aware or cognizant of when we can communicate out in a given situation whether that's in real time or whether that's structured and strategic throughout the day what we don't want to do is spread misinformation and so while you may always get your information from social media we would pref we would prefer not to get our information from social media and we would prefer to get our information from our investigatory practices our building administrators our kids kids our staff and our First Responders and that's the information that we want to be able to push out whether that's jointly with with our law enforcement Partners or other entities um or whether it's individual to the school or to the building um many times we'll push out communication that is building based or School Community specific to that building and not necessarily districtwide we have a lot of neighborhood schools right and putting all of our business out there while yes that can be informative is not always critical and and supporting the nature of what's going on in that particular community school and so we're never going to win that social media battle or how we communicate what we communicate but we do want to be vigilant about making sure we structure the times in which we do consistent for every building for every situation for every incident to further that just in terms of time when I talk to our building leaders I tried to say to them yes we have phenomenal first responding Partners across five police jurisdictions two fire departments multiple EMA agencies they're amazing and they they work with us so closely but it it is critical and imperative that you in the building are an initial responder that we have to be able to stand on our own and support our staff and our students yes and be ready to stand on our own until those folks come to arrive it's so important and we pride ourselves as a student services team on being responsive to that that if you call us we will take your call we can walk you through those initial stages on the phone we can send Michael or Michelle to a team to support we can jump on your cameras and see um and we will do whatever we can to support and work with you to try and give back that time so you can make those good decisions in those time of Crisis I will tell you that these guys we we send them when we get a call depending on kind of how we've articulated that level we're sending administrators to the building to say what do you need how can we help we're not coming in to direct we're coming in to say you know what to do what can we do what can we do to help and I saw it firstand and it worked brilliantly so just kudos to your team so my question actually um well first before I go to my question um these last three presentations just today alone have really underscored the amount of work um that has gone into strategizing planning um and even informing all of our staff and so um we have made extraordinary Pro progress in the last 12 to 18 months so I just want to say thank you first off really thank you um and we haven't even we're not even today today talking about the high quality instruction um but it's a lot of information and so my question is is how are we assessing our staff's ability to accept retain and then follow through on all that we are asking them to do because if they are the first line of defense um and we've had a a phenomenal example today that we celebrated but I think that a part of all of our assessment is to ensure that they're able to retain all of this information in a way that they can respond to it real time so you may not have to go into great detail I understand what it is but just a a brief overview of how are we assessing that we are for lack of better terms prepared I I think being intentional even our most recent school Improvement day we provided contractual time for for staff to to participate in those online Al modules and then ask the building principles and assistant principles to sit with their staff and to have conversations in a tabletop format to be able to process the information that they learned right so it's just creating space and being intentional whether it's around high quality instruction whether it's around equity and rightful presence whether it's around Safety and Security we have to let that collaborative process um and conversation because you can't just automatically read something all the time internalize it and then put it into action it takes that dialogue and that narrative to work its way out but we're doing it you saw evidence of that with our staff member that was recognized tonight like there that's impact monitoring right there the fact that we can see um and highlight an individual that took it upon themselves to follow through on things that they had been trained in that they had been made aware of those aren't things that you can me I would love to say you can measure them because I don't want them to ever happen right but those aren't things you can always measure um but it's a great question and and I'm I'm sorry go ahead I was just going to add to that to your question the board invested in the director for professional learning why because we needed to start to think about how do we prioritize all these various amends our Educators have a limited amount of time to plan their classrooms prepare communicate with parents identify their own learning needs move on those right so how do we the boards investment in those things provided an opportunity to start to get up on the balcony to really look at the whole system to them being able to organize how we think we have not changed completely but these are examples of that coordinated effort coming to fruition I would also add that it's just going to take um this is the kind of thing where working with our Union partners and I want to just underscore the power of our school leaders our principles system principles really the school leaders teams which includes Educators as well to really develop effective School Improvement plannings where they are thinking about these things as part of their design for their learning work yeah and I and I and I I thank you both for sharing that and just to add to what JY said this is the reason why I'm saying it is that I want to make sure that the community sees and understands the amount of progress that has been made in the last 12 to 18 months because when you don't and you hear something going on at the school immediately your your knee-jerk reaction will be to respond based on what you thought the system used to look like and so I just appreciate you all coming in to underscore and to share you know even as a parent I understand because emotionally I want to go in to make sure that my my kids are are okay as well but coming in could also be a hindrance to all of the things that you all have put in place because me on the outside even as board me I don't know any of the details that that's behind the emergency plan so if I go in I could actually be a hindrance or in the way to it and so I just I just wanted to again underscore and say thank you to all of you because the the the community um through this presentation and then through them really experience it experiencing all that you have done will continue to give them the confidence to know that their kids are safe when they come to sd308 so thank you can I take that to another level yes um because you said we're never going to win with social media and um I I think that's pretty much a popular sentiment but I'm not willing to seed that um I'm not willing to seed that as an educator that there's not still hope for us to recognize that um what we experience when we're doing exactly what you're saying is is the chaos that would exist without our systems so if we don't nurture our systems if we don't have the experts taking the lead on those systems and if we don't granted I I give you that we have to have faith um but we also have to have a dialogue on those systems and a dialogue with those experts and if people don't recognize that those systems need nurturing they are experiencing exactly what life would be like without those systems and what they don't realize or what they haven't pieced together is what they're experiencing is chaos and the chaos of not chaos right the chaos of not understanding in that particular moment exactly what's going on but whether we realize it or not every single day we give Faith to a system when I drive up to the stoplight and it turns green I have faith that some some one fix the other lane to go red right and so um like I of course we're going to be able to point out when the systems don't work that's great there should be a dialogue with that piece but to um completely undermine the system in the process well welcome to chaos and that's sometimes what people are experiencing and they don't even recognize or realize it so I'm not willing to seed it I think the dialogues matter from a government govern role with their communities and I think there's a way for us to have that dialogue and help each other to realize that the systems are never going to be perfect but that is far better than having the chaos that people are experiencing in the moment so I'm not ready to seed it and nobody say anything wrong I'm just as an educator I'm not ready to seed it yet really can can I point out the gaps which is from a govern abolutely that should be part of the dialogue a governance perspective we are not the communicator the administration the building leaders are the communicators and so how do we and I'll give you a very specific example um how do we like for instance when the threats were happening we saw it across the country right we saw that somebody posted a threat online and so forth and we saw the snowball effect of that in our district and the communication gap of H and yes we did make we did take steps but how do we get to the people that aren't looking for that I would I would say this right as a teacher who was in uh a classroom where I had students that were coming up to me who were showing me their phones who were concerned those students listen I I don't know how to say this to the adults those students actually have more faith in the system than sometimes we do and we're demonstrate well I'm getting there I'm trying to anyways that there we are demonstrating a lack of systems and a lot of the students the young people are looking to us I've got students who are coming up to me and saying hey um this is what's coming on my phone I'm doing my part and I'm like absolutely you're doing your part I send my email right away you know I flag it and and and that's the system otherwise if I'm sitting there saying I don't know it's just crazy world and throw my hands up in the air then then that's the chaos that we don't understand as the leaders and the and everything else that we're actually fueling I would make an argument that the students understand the system sometimes better than the adults do we have two students here oh I was actually going to chime into this come on students I was actually going to chime into this exact topic about the statement about social media because I feel like it's very important to understand that our society right now is very social mediad driven you see everything is on social media now there's you don't need to really watch TV to figure out what's going on um my question and it's probably going to be a really loaded question that if you can answer that'd be great but a lot of before someone makes huge threats of course there's feelings that go into it probably a student has been thinking about this idea or has been you know contemplating about this ideology and so they go ahead and make this post whether it's on a private story or for like you know certain people to see whether it's you know Global that they every anyone can see it my question is how do you or how do you take teachers responding just like he said mentioned um students posting such things such threats because I feel like we we need to to also use social media as our leeway to get quick information about a threat before cuz also investigate and then you can tell me if you can but like it takes a long time to really get into the nitty-gritty about investigating cases and investigating situations but sometimes it's like right in front of you the student posted it you can see who posted it it it says it right there but like taking it seriously like how do you go forth about like so I'd love to answer that um yes please do that's a great question passionate about re assessment um our our process here in 308 is extensive and we built it from the ground up coming from law enforcement I was trained in doing threat assessment as the on the police side and I've been doing threat assessments for almost 20 years and like Mr Bell said it it's really driven at the core value of it is to try and understand in that moment why would a person say to another person something so and disturbing to threaten another person's life and what the research will say is that more often than not threats are a reflection of an inner struggle that I threaten my kids almost every day that if you don't get out of that bathroom and get off your phone and get to school on time I'm taking your phone I'm threatening them rather than probably addressing it in a in a way where I can have a creative conversation like in the moment I just need them to do something so I I throw out a threat and and humans are like that where if I get to a point where I am under so much stress and other things in my life I may say something that is completely uncharacteristic and make a statement that is completely inappropriate those are the instances where we can provide those supports and those guidance that education to those those kids where they can make better choices and keep them on a path to goodness I say uh rather than towards a path of violence which is really what we the whole goal of the the program the universal screener that was so eloquently said thank you Mike for that I mean it's just a power of this idea of humanization and bringing a reality to what's happening in those situations and I want to underscore here the universal screener that we've just applied this your Panorama to your question those types of that's a baseline to understanding the temperature of our community and that now finally will give our staff re information real time to really start to think about where are those needs and where are those hotpots to see what kinds of attention what kind of personalization we can bring to students so we're not waiting for the threat we're catching it and we're getting Downstream in terms of addressing the culture and moving from reaction to prevention and that's the power of that Dr Paul do you want to add to that well you just hit it right on the the nail and the head um we're wanting to move our system to be proactive and preventative versus reactive and responsive so um there's a a lot of collaboration actually with learning Innovation and student services my former team um we talk about that a lot and how we can continue to move our system in that space and use the data to help inform our practices um in the classrooms you raised a really great point about social media thank you for sharing can I can we dig into her comment a little bit and unpack it because I'm not even sure did if we answered it because one of the things that you said I think is incredibly important the threat is right in front of us and I I'll give you a very specific example so my my son will kill me for doing this but I was a part of this situation so this happens with this team actually not everybody gets to call Dr katti and be like what do I do with this it was also in a week where it was the same threat over and over this team had to investigate every single one of them and they had no idea whether it was the same threat or not the same threat but they took every single one individually but what happened is is when it's perpetuated in the school and you're seeing it in front of you and someone else seeing it in front of them and someone else seeing it in front of them it's very hard and we're overwhelming the system whereas if the one person turned it in and let the team do their thing we want everybody to turn it in but what's happening and what happened that week is it was just a deluge of like over and over it was repeating the same threat and so why I wanted to bring this up and why when you said well what if it's in front of us have to weed through all of that they have to weed through every single instance of that and I think it's really important to have that conversation which is social media amplifies that sometimes when what we need to do is let them do it and let let them do their job and make sure that we can identify what threats are real and what threats are don't because what we don't want to do is we don't want to normalize any of this we want students to understand that this is not okay and if you need help we will get you help but I also think that they don't also understand the end the tail end of it which is when you make a threat like that how it changes your life depending on the type of threat the severity of the threat doing something like that because social media is so much a part of your life and at your fingertips and you're like oh I'm going to send this on Snapchat or I'm going to forward it on a text message when you amplify that the cost of doing that is high on so in so many places and I also I it breaks my heart when I hear those students been arrested or detained or going to Juvenile Justice because they simply forwarded or sent a Snapchat they don't realize what that does for their their future and so I think it's really important but you I I just you guys are nailing this we should just let them take over our board meetings because that is it you if you would if the one person would just take see say something say something turn it in I Jared's right we can't not have the conversation we social media is a part of our life I think we also need to figure out how we're going to mitigate the negativity of social media and what it and what it amplifies when right now we need them to be able to do their job about all creating all this extra like you said Eugene running to the school calling the school you know the the amount of phone calls that they get you know and so forth and just follow the protocol so how do we get better what that protocol is and what the ramifications are if you do something do do you know do you and your classmates know what happens if you make a threat like this and that you could possibly be charged with a felony or go into Juvenile Justice or so forth understanding what those ramifications are are also part I think of our responsibility of letting them know that this isn't something really simple like haha or sending you know something it has real true ramifications so keep asking these really important questions and use them as a focus group whenever you need some and feedback done you're hired all the time but re real quick though real quick oh go ahead sorry I can't see you like adding on to that maybe like incorporate because I work I also do like on the side I work with the juvenile Kendall Juvenile Justice council at Kendall County courthouse and I deal with a lot of um students coming in from like you know high schools and like you know they're not in classes anymore because of you know certain behavioral issues and I feel like it's not talked about in our classes like you couldn't even ask me to like tell you what's going to happen if I send a type of threat maybe like mitigating like how do you pronounce it mitigate miate mitigate mitigating yes sorry mitigating um our emotions and uh reacting to instead of just posting how we feel maybe talking to somebody El because I can only imagine the stress that you guys get with so many parents emailing you about a situation in five different versions because also social media will do that you'll have one situation in five different versions so I also understand that and I commend you guys for the efforts that you do especially in our schools the US is crazy with school shootings and all that stuff so I commend you guys you guys are doing a great job but maybe you can create some type of um like a campaign like you could create some type of a campaign that would you know help your students to or our students to understand the ramifications of such conversations um behaviors actions so you can just write that for the next ssac we can talk about it there re real quick and I'll I'll make this short one of the things that I think all of us can do is understand and celebrate when the systems work yes I mean I mean I like like I just I'm just saying like that's something we can do is understand say when the systems work right so I would imagine that last week or whenever that week was when all of that was happening you guys didn't have a run on of parents running up to the school to get their kid out did you when you had your what was that home SEC what was that one hold secure remember that and teach you secure and teach you didn't have a run on of parents coming up to the school to get their kids so something's working right y that's true something something's working so we just continue and um you know do more do more do good do more what was really what was really cool and I hate that I have this experience but it was so cool to see it I've told everybody about it is Mr Belle was there the police were there everything was there but the building really handled it they really handled it and what was even cooler is they sat down with my son and asked what they did well what could we ly they really incorporate student voice into this situation and that is I don't think we can ask any more of these folks I think they're I think the system is working please don't because I want them to stay I want to just close out thank you so much for your presentation for your time um we're going to keep learning and working together thank you all again for coming this evening do we have any public comments okay okay so we are moving past 6.1 public comment we are moving on to 7.1 student I mean I'm sorry 7.1 superintendent report so ask Dr katti to give his superintendent report well I kind of feel like it was made this evening because we had quite uh robust presentations but I do want to take a minute and uh want to extend uh our warm wishes to all those who are observing rashash Shana uh may this season be one that brings you joy happiness and A Renewed sense of purpose board this past week I um had a opportunity uh to visit the Kendall County food pantry did I get that Kendall County food thank you Kendall County Community Food Pantry uh it's it's a mouthful and it's worth every effort because that effort of our community is truly incredible um in about a week from now we are going to be starting this off and our district has played an incred a crucial role in this event one of the things that when I visited one of the things I noticed was just that just a tremendous outpouring of volunteer support for the Kendall County Community Food Pantry um was truly remarkable um it it is when you think about the health of a community think about its effort to serve those who need and those who want and that is truly a a trail bdge I know there are lots of examples of that in our community and this was my first time seeing this particular one and I'm so grateful for it um in addition to that the the way the experience that those who are looking for support experience it is truly nobling a great lesson and and you enter it's like visiting a grocery store or a department store with Target kind of feel right they have uh all kinds of food wears U merchandise um presented in a really Noble way that I think is example and I want to thank our community we are about to reach our 2 million Mark is that correct in contributions to this pantry and that's a huge yeah I see somebody clapping that is definitely something to clap for and uh we will once again join a um as a district and through the collection of certain cash donations we'll make an amazing donation they talked about cash donations also making a big difference that $1 can go a long way can actually equal I think they said eight equals eight items so even a dollar for our students listening who love to collect pennies collect those pennies it will go a long way every single piece counts um again we will begin this will begin October 13th and uh is just again if you visit our website sd308.org I invite everybody to check it out it's a great place to see what's happening relate to this I want to then take a minute to really speak to um a lot of our communities in the southeast of our nation are really under duress as we think about the struggles of the hurricane I think it's really important for us to take note of that and to really reflect and send our our thoughts and our care and I know that there are a lot of local efforts also to supply and to provide uh assistance to those there and we want to thank everybody who's been involved with that um it's not lost to me the impact of our efforts as a nation to support those who are in struggle and that's both reflected locally and across across our our nation um also today on a more somber note we take notice of the the significant um horrible escalation of loss of life since October 7th of last year um really it's a continuation of that but I I know that it's continued and it's on a lot of people's hearts we want everybody to know that we extend our deepest sympathies to those whose communities have been impacted um we in fact are all impacted by this and we need to take note of that um our district is committed to a safe and supportive learning environment for all of our students and staff and to supporting and encouraging free expression among our students and to a curriculum that promotes tolerance and prevents bias-based harm I want to now welcome other board members who want to add some sh can I just ask one did you say for the community the community Pantry did you say October 13th it launches it correct online online starts October 13th and donations they need volunteers and stuff like that okay got it I I could tell you that we could always use more volunteers at the pantry so the the one at Old Trower is the first Friday of every month and there's a actually there's a number of teachers and staff that are there that volunteer as well we could always use more love it pardon it is um the shift is is basically from 5:15 to about 7:45 at 6:00 to 7:30 that the pantry is open you thank you mayor Joe Jaden Thompson AO East High School senior organized a walk to raise awareness for distracted driving her inspiration comes after a difficult recovery due to a car collision caused by a distracted driver the walk will be held at the weatland elementary school on Saturday October 12th from 10:00 a.m.

by moderator John W Thompson who called on do on Reverend Robert E O'Brien to offer prayer and the what let's see the first article was the following Town officers were elected surveyors of lumber and the measure of wood and bark following committees reported the Fruit Street school committee School building committee the civil defense shelter study committee and let's see a report on progress of the Ashland Junior High School building Committee in 1964 they actually list and note this the salaries let's see wow okay I should have been a select board member in 1964 the selectman chair the chairman had a salary of $600 for those of you who don't realize all select board members all school committee members all elected officials in our town are now volunteers so thank you 100th birthday oh okay the next thing is the ashlin's 100th birthday so 1846 to 1946 and it's a program of events uh so some leaders and there are a number of um ads Baldwin White and Company investment Securities let's see what else anything we know Wyman's Framingham at nurseries hebden Robert D hebden from 43 Granite Street in Ashland you're in the book Rob made made the pages I was around I made it oh this is good emergency calls in case of fire dial 873 8875 if busy dial operator say emergency Ashlin fire department give name Street and number okay so it used to be that they would do a blast regarding schools so the no school signal five blasts at 6:45 a.m.

to noon the popup will be at Pine Hill Road interested residents can host future pop-up events in their neighborhoods by contacting the sustainability office Town Hall Renovations ongoing Renovations at Ashton's historic town hall involve exterior repairs siding Replacements and painting portions of the parking lot will be closed but Public Access will be maintained during business hours the project is expected to take two months weather permitting residents are asked to use Main Street parking for drop boxes as some areas will be closed new firefighter Ashlin fire department has welcomed firefighter Isaac Carlson who was sworn in this week he will undergo a 1month orientation before attending firefighting training in December at the Massachusetts Department of fire services Academy some Town job openings Ashland is hiring for several positions including part-time roles like a police department cross crossing guard ban driver for the Council on Aging and after school Recreation assistant full-time positions include water technicians and heavy equipment operators a full list of available jobs can be found online cultural Council grants the fy2 grant cycle is open for applications through October 16th grants of up to $1,000 are available for projects that enrich the Ashland Community provideed they are open to the public or benefit Ashland residents cultural Council survey the Ashland cultural council is seeking Community input to better serve residents needs through a brief survey the survey results will help guide future projects and priorities for the council don't forget car seat check the ashin fire department will hold a free car seat check on Saturday October 12th from 9:00 a.m.

Saturday at 8:00 a.m. and Sunday at 2: p.m. and you can always watch it on our Dartmouth High uh media channel a YouTube channel so i' just like to remind everyone to please silence their cell phones uh if you haven't done so at this time and if I could have a roll call please Chris Oliver here Elizabeth Coughlin here Kathleen Amal here Mary Beck here John Nunes yep thank you very much everyone uh I would ask for uh the committee's uh pleasure if everyone is okay with moving public comment this evening based on uh the uh presentation of the district strategic plan uh that I felt it it would be helpful if we move that to the end of tonight's agenda uh for this one time so we'd give our audience members people in the audience any uh opportunities to ask questions following it considering that we are going to be discussing it is uh anyone opposed oos to that I think it's great all right thank you very much I appreciate it all appreciate you all uh at this time chair will entertain a motion to approve the regular session minutes of September 23rd 2024 so moved second so we got a motion by Mr Nunes a second by Miss Beckwith all on the motion any further discussion sh hearing none all in favor I I opposed motion carries unanimously thank you very much uh chair will entertain a motion to approve the executive session minutes from The Joint meeting uh with the select board on September 23rd so move Mr chairman with the stipulation that they be held until the matter for which they were intended is complete have a motion do we have a second second motion by Mr noon second by Mrs Amaral on the motion any further discussion chair hearing none all in favor I I opposed I will abstain yeah I will I was that I was there okay okay so yep motion passes uh 4 to zero no she wasn't there that was when with the select board correct Iain second that we have quum oh thank you yes yeah I'm seconding it I was not I was not there so I'm seconding it okay so motion by Mr noon a second by Miss Coughlin exstension motion passes 3 to zero with two extensions thank you everyone for that it's always the little things that get us hung up yep uh next up I'm pleased to uh recognize our student representative uh Jordan Rosenberg and we welcome you to the dart school committee meeting and we ask invite you to share what's going on at dmouth high school hi thank you for having me so the first thing I wanted to go over was we had a successful Club Expo recently it took place during the Lunch Period and it was just a great way for everyone to see what kind of clubs the students are running in the school especially for freshmen who want to get more involved we also have the Freshman elections coming up and the student council will be running those so recently we've had student council members go to advisories of freshmen and just explain the logistics of the elections and with more info to come midterms are approaching towards the end of the week so this will just be a good way for people to see how they're doing with classes if they need more help or how their grades are holding up um student council is planning a trunk Retreat fundraiser on October 6th so that'll be a really fun event we're planning to have it in the parking lot of the high school and we're going to have candy different treats a fun uh raffle and fundraiser so we encourage people to go to that and contribute also at our recent advisory students have filled out the neas survey and we asked that parents also fill out the survey and it's basically an evaluation of the high school and to see if the school standards are meeting what students and parents are seeing day-to-day as well um and lastly we our sports teams are also doing very well as mid te mid season is also approaching uh excitingly the football team is 4 in one so any questions good any questions for Jordan when's the the Trunk or Treat is what the it's October 26th okay well thank you very much Jordan for your report uh we certainly appreciate it as we do all our student reps you're more than welcome I'll say what I say I said a few weeks ago you're more than welcome to stick around with us and participate in the meeting um but we understand if you have other obligations all right thank you thank you uh next up consent agenda items uh I'm going to turn it over to Dr Saba Maguire yes you can see that we have a number of schools who have submitted fundraising requests for the 2025 school year parter Quinn uh Dartmouth Middle School the Dello School the Dartmouth SMA I mean I have to say I'm so impressed with all all of the efforts that are going on in the community amongst the different parent groups and making sure that our students have opportunities um just beyond what schools provide but also coming from the community itself so I think that uh tonight's consent agenda is truly representative of all that families are doing out there to support their children in Dartmouth so I recommend that we accept that's that the committee accepts um the fundraising requests uh for the 20242 school year thank you Dr Sab questions from my colleagues just a comment thank you all for participating in the parent teacher organizations and um you really make possible so much more for our community than we would have without your efforts um the students benefit primarily and we really really appreciate it I would second that and I I didn't tally it up but I I have no doubts in the tens of thousands of dollars that are being it's absolutely being greatly appreciated you want all one motion to approve them or you want them individually I don't see why we can't do one motion for all of them Mr chairman make a motion we approve the part of school PTO fundraising requests the Quin school PTO fundraising request uh dth middle school PTO fundraising requests the Dello school PTO fundraising requests and the dsma Damas school music association fundraising requests all for school year second motion by Mr nun second by Miss Beckwith on the motion any further discussion J hearing none all in favor I I I opposed extensions motion carries unanimously thank you again for all of those uh PT members that are in the audience this evening uh we certainly thank you for your support and now the uh the highlight of the night I'm going to turn it over it's a lot of pressure Mr Oliver the highlight of the night I'm going to turn it over to our superintendent of schools uh for our district strategic plan yes so thank you so we are truly excited to be able to share with the public tonight the uh five-year the public and the committee The Five-Year District strategic plan for Dartmouth um we believe that and I'll talk about this throughout I will talk about this throughout our presentation that we had um a a unique um amount of representation in developing this plan and as we go through some of the slides we'll share with you some of the folks that were involved and hopefully as we share this publicly uh no matter who you are or what part of the community that you serve you will see that your voice has been taken into consideration and incorporated into the plan that we're going to present to you uh we have a number of people here with us tonight we're going to take some time to thank them at the end of the presentation and that's just to keep them here till the end so they can't sneak out and we can take a photo uh we want to make sure that that we have a photo of all of the folks that are here tonight T and uh and the we want to represent who you are and where you're from in the community in terms of developing this actual plan so before we get started I would like to invite um Kathleen Smith from teaching Learning Alliance to the podium uh you'll have to sneak behind through a few obstacles uh but uh Kath Kathy is here tonight representing TLA teaching Learning Alliance tlaa was the Consulting Group that we used to help to facilitate our process um PM Gould was our our main contact and Kathy came on board with her I have to say that I have a long relationship with Kathy Smith um worked with her back in the day in Brockton and I was really pleased that she was on board with us here in Dartmouth to help guide us through this process so I wanted to invite Kathy to say a few words thank you uh Dr saber Maguire and it is Wonder ful to be back in the Dartmouth Community um I'm glad Jun you mentioned uh Dr Pam Gould who oversaw this process it was actually my first time doing a strategic plan with a district as a consultant and I know we've said this to our team a number of times you have set the bar very high it is the gold standard and when I tell you in the end after looking at all of your elected officials John and Elizabeth certainly from your school committee your Town elected officials a district that pays attention to its students and their voice that was heard loud and clear to your teachers to your families to your community members you have an excellent strategic plan that is a living document that will live probably beyond the five years when you see and I'm sure you've seen the scope of what's ahead hours and hours were spent with this group and I will tell you this having been an education and a superintendent in five districts in dealing with strategic plans and Community to look at the way people were not afraid to share their ideas if something was missing that empty chair that each of you honored because they represented somebody else or a group or an entity and you could hear that loud and clear as this as this strategic plan you know came to life so again um I guess on a personal note I am so pleased to come into this district and to see the that you have Dr Jun Saba Maguire she talks about all the and I know her I know when she talks about the excitement or just seeing the wonderful things that are happening are when we met with students and I sat back very proud so this is back last February we met with a focus group of probably about 20 students freshman sophomore junior and seniors and the one thing that they said and I know her and they said Dr Maguire actually came and this was a young girl one of my basketball games can you imagine the superintendent coming and thinking that we were that important so I'm so proud I listened to how wonderful everything has been a lot of challenges a lot of work ahead but you have the right person in that job and she has the right people supporting her so congratulations to your entire I really didn't expect her to say all that I just want you to know that that was purposeful but thank you and that's where I learned everything that I know so I'm okay with that thank you so thank you thanks so we're going to now get into the actual presentation of the district strategic plan I know that Jonathan's over there skillfully changing the screen so that the presentation is yep see he's calm cool and [Laughter] collected so now I I can make changes is yeah I don't it's not is it on oh it's on now Ross you didn't turn the the remote on for me Dr t-bo okay so um as uh as Mrs Smith was saying uh the Strategic is meant to it's a five-year strategic plan but please keep in mind that that doesn't mean as we work through the plan there won't be adjustments or modifications based upon how we work through others to enact this plan um but this is meant to be the 2024 through 2029 plan and what I also hope that you see as we go through the plan is that much of this work is actually happening and so it's not that after and hopefully the committee approves the plan this evening but it's not as if we haven't been enacting some of what we know uh the next right steps uh for moving the district forward and so here is a snapshot of the many members of the district strategic planning team and again we'll invite them up at the end uh to take a photo but hopefully what you can see here is that there are a wide range of both uh internal School Department uh teachers um Tas or esps I should say uh we have Administration we have folks from the select board we have parents um we have finance committee member and what we worked toward and we thought was most important is we had we had three students also on our team um so when we submit the final plan and it's published you'll see who all these folks are are and what uh they represented in terms of where they what their represent representation was in terms of of the community itself um so we talk a lot about what is our why and it's something that we've worked on quite a bit in the district at least since that I've come in as a superintendent and so it's always all the work that we do we recognize always has to be uh grounded in what is our our why so for a strategic plan why do we need a strategic plan and why is it important to a school Community our strategic plan helps create a shared vision and common purpose for every member of the one Dartmouth Community it identifies our District's Mission core values goals and the underlying theory of action that we believe ultimately will allow us to make good on our promise to the community of providing unparalleled opportunities leading to educational Excellence for for current and future Generations it helps guide us when making important decisions identifying areas of need committing resources human physical and financial it serves as a road map for our school district and so one thing that was important to us early on was honoring the work of those who had been part of the initial District Strate core District strategic planning team and with that team they spent I think it was uh almost two years developing the portrait of a learner and what those five competencies are each of the five C's were developed again with input from a range of community members including Educators families and caregivers students at the high school level and town officials so while this rep representation is not quite complete we are working on uh graphic design it does incorporate the competencies that we've defined as developmentally appropriate to communicate exactly what we mean when we say dmouth public school learners are critical thinkers and problem solvers they're communicators they are continuous Learners they're contributing citizens and their collaborators and these initiatives which are outlined in our strategic plan will allow us to bring the portrait of a learner into Focus across our district pre to 12 so next we just wanted to uh remind people that this was in fact a comprehensive process that began in Earnest back in the 2022 23 school year during that year the core of strategic plan of the planning team was formed and focused on developing the portrait of a learner that is what was done as the community these are the essential skills and characteristics that all Learners who passed through the Dartmouth Public Schools should be supported in me in mastering uh we worked we went on to focus the efforts of broader strategic planning work uh with the again many members of the one Dartmouth community and we partnered with teaching and Learning Alliance we believe that our strategic planning timeline reflects an inclusive process that honor Collective voices of the D Dartmouth community so again some important um I think some important messages here are who informed the district strategic plan stakeholder input well that included the portrait of a learner survey entry plan survey listening tour focus groups we use comprehensive data sources and artifacts the previous strategic plan was was discussed it was absolutely used as a a resource to to look at what was in the previous District strategic plan and see what needed to continue to we needed to continue to move forward we used the air report mcast data AP data the capital Improvement plan budget proposals Etc so these were all of the different stakeholder groups and artifacts that were used in in to inform the strategic plan we were regularly reminded that although there were 36 people as part of our team many of you are whom are here this evening we have what you see there as the empty chair and we constantly I think reminded each other and held each other accountable for continuing to bring back the work we were doing to those that were our colleagues community members family members Etc and to make sure that we were thinking about the kind of of data and um information that was being shared with us even though those particular people may not have been in the room so summary of the strategic planning process you can see phase one we're building the foundation and that came again even before I um before I began in Dartmouth as superintendant and that was around your portrait of a learner but for me coming in was really building my my part in building the foundation was around entry planning and spending time getting to know the community and we did that in multiple ways we did that by visiting schools we did that by visiting pto's we had a family Forum uh we sent out surveys uh but the best way I think that we learned about what we needed to do in working with the Dartmouth Community to move it forward was just listening to people and so we did have focus groups again TLA helped us to facilitate some of that um so there were quite a number of of people whose voices are represented in what we're presenting to you this evening so here with our mission statement so there's always so much sort of angst over developing a mission a vision in your core values but what what a mission statement does for us is it explains who we are and it highlights our fundamental reason for existing when others read the mission statement they should understand what our core role is as a school district the mission creates fundamental questions for all all organizations to ask what is it that we do who benefits from our work and what are the results of our work so our mission statement and hopefully as I read through it you'll be thinking about those three things what is it that we do who benefits from our work work and what are the results of the work so with a 36ers committee again including uh the voices of others this is our statement together with students staff families and Community we are committed to cultivating a safe supportive and inclusive learning environment that empowers all students to become compassionate informed and contributing members of our local and Global community and something that I think that really stood out as we did this work together was how grounded the folks that were involved and and again through surveys focus groups Etc in the idea of supporting local community that was something that came through um through again any of of the sort of data collection that we did the the pride in Dartmouth and the idea that this was such a uh vital Community uh supportive of one another was something that was clearly communicated uh throughout this process and so as far as core values are concerned again something that was truly important to this group and they took very seriously um there was a group that you can see that we have the acronym Pride I already just mentioned that Pride came through as something that was important to people and they definit itely expressed a wish to have pride be something that permeates throughout the entire plan so for core values we have personal excellence and responsibility respect for self and others inclusivity equity and belonging diverse opportunities and student agency voice and choice very important to the group that voice and choice was included and most especially our students um and ethical commitments and we talked a lot about ethical commitments in in our district and it's something that we have a lot of conversation about uh with our entire leadership team and with our Educators so remembering that core value should remain constant and that they shouldn't change even in an Ever Changing world for a vision statement again these are the things we look at the final product and think oh that's you know I can that resonates with me but when I tell you that the work that went into uh what I think uh people came to uh to accept and and say this this is what we were thinking this was hours and hours of work um United as one Dartmouth we are invested in the ongoing Improvement of our community so that's a pretty uh strong statement and a statement that we're sharing with the rest of the Dartmouth community in different ways uh for example I was able to to meet with Amy drio from the Council on Aging and share that part of our vision statement with them and with that group and she is going to take that and work with her staff to develop the second part of the statement which is Dartmouth Public Schools proudly offers unparalleled opportunities leading to educational excellence and success for fut for current and future Generations again the idea of generational um sort of support and what that means in contributing to the Dartmouth Community was a really strong message throughout so as far as a theory of action an organization's theory of action represents a set of actions that will be implemented in order to improve the organization and help it it reach its Mission um so I'm not going to read this theory of action to you but what I will say is if you take the time to read the theory of action in many ways the theory of action is the uh the summarization of the entire strategic plan and so you should be able to see in there the mission the vision the core values the four areas of focus and then ultimately what our uh goal is in implementing this strategic plan and so now I'm going to invite uh Ross up he's going to talk about the action plan layout and give you an idea an an overview really of some of the high leverage initiatives that are included in the plan thank you Dr sa Maguire so our strategic plan we really as Cathy alluded to earlier we we want it to be a living breathing document and so in order to achieve that um goal we really believe that there's value in uh understanding the community as a whole understanding exactly how the action plan is laid out so in the broadest area we see um the focus area we have four main focus uh areas then just under uh just beneath those uh Focus areas we have our objective so our objective is a slightly more defined goal that we're hoping to achieve underneath that uh larger kind of umbrella from there we have uh our strategic initiatives outlined and each of the focus area has multiple strategic initiatives um our strategic initiatives are the strategies that we plan to employ in order to achieve the uh objective at the most granular level um we have the action steps these are very detailed intended to be very detailed actions that the district will take in order to uh achieve our goal and to implement fully Implement our uh strategic initiatives we also have I don't know why I keep jump in twice we also have our proposed timeline uh for the work again proposed because it is going to be a living breathing document so we may have to make adjustments along the way um but we wanted to clearly communicate to the community here's the proposed and planned timeline that we uh intend to um to to carry out the next column here is the led by and this is specifically um only highlighting folks who are resp ultimately responsible for facilitating the work this is not this column is not indicative of every single uh person who's going to be part of all of this important work that's going on um we wanted to make sure that um we highlight the fact that none of this work will be accomplished without the uh tremendous input of the community without our Educators um you know and everyone that's part of the one Dartmouth community and then the final column here really identifies the measures of success these of multiple measures um with our uh with each action step we've identified a series of different um measurements if you will to determine whether or not our uh action plan has been successful so each uh as I said there are four Focus areas the first one is around teaching and learning and uh our our objective for teaching and learning is to support the varied needs of students and staff through best practices while promoting innovation in a hor horizontally and vertically aligned curriculum for our second Focus area it is um are you hitting it too I that's the problem I'm hitting it on this computer and you're hitting it with the clicker my fault I apologize I all right our second Focus area is safe and supportive schools and um this uh Focus area it's all about ensuring that uh students and Staff feel a sense of belonging as well as um you know attending to social emotional well-being in our schools throughout the implementation of culturally and intellectually affirming practices and tiered supports Focus area three oh Focus area three is around family and Community engagement um and it it highlights the importance of engaging with families and community members as partners in our school uh district and uh in our students uh continued success under this Focus area our goal is about enhancing and strengthening existing Partnerships while also seeking opportunities uh to build new Partnerships and strengthen uh new Partnerships across the district and then finally um focus area four is um you know in many ways uh the most important um it's budget and Capital Improvements and um our goal there is to enhance collaboration between schools town government the commu and the community with the goal of creating a joint Vision to address school funding facility issues and staff recruitment um and of course without uh tremendous support in that area none of the uh the work is possible so at this time I'd like to invite Mrs Pavo up to talk a little bit more about Focus area one teaching and learning thank you Dr tibo and members of the school committee for this opportunity to talk about this most important work um I'd like to talk about our first and obviously my most favorite Focus area of teaching learning so um as mentioned our first initiative under teaching Lear teaching learning is one that you've heard Dr TBO and I talk about and great detail um and it's clearly an issue of importance uh when we did analysis of our stakeholder and Survey data this was something that repeatedly came up um across forums across stakeholder groups and that is around um ensuring vertically and horizontally aligned curriculum prek to 12 um and making sure that we are using data to inform our instruction around our needs and um obviously we did a everyone did a great job sort of talking about the portrait of a learner work that has already been done that has also outlined the values and the things that we know to be important in our community um additionally when we talk about teaching and learning um I think when we hear the word learning we naturally tend to think about our students learning but of equal importance is the learning of our Educators sorry Dr s McGuire I'll I'll we'll hit the button you want no it's okay I got it sorry so I'm talking about these initiatives and now I'll show them too um our second initiative is around designing professional learning opportunities that are relevant and support the professional growth for our Educators and our staff and so as I was saying I think sometimes when we hear learning we our brain naturally sort of leans to thinking about our student learning but it is of equal importance that we continue to Foster the growth of our Educators and finally we're talking about reimagining and expanding our um educational Pathways and opportunities for our students um and you know it's really about making sure that we create opportunities for our students to feel like they can grow to be their best selves and the all the things that are encompassed in our portrait of a learner are things that we're giving our students opportunities to practice to refine and to figure out and and to grow as to be their their best version of themselves and so it might seem like the natural Next Step would be to talk about our action steps but we're actually going to talk about our measures of success next in a very similar way that we often do backward design when we're planning lessons and units our first step is to think about where do we want our kids to end up what do we want them to know and be able to do and so in the designing of these Focus areas it really made sense for us to say what are our measures of success what are our goals what are our outcomes in this area and then we can start to talk about what we would do to get there so in that sort of backwards design model these are certainly not the all encompassed these are a few that we'd like to elevate um in our full plan you would see all of those measures of success under teaching and learning but three that we wanted to lift up and talk a little bit more about in detail tonight again is one you've heard me talk a lot about is that published curriculum review cycle when we're talk about when we're talking about um an aligned curriculum prek to 12 we have to talk about doing that in a cular cular way where we are repeatedly and um consistently looking at the revisions that need to be made to our curriculum looking at bringing in new high quality instructional materials when the time is necessary Dr tibo talked about budget having the implications and there are common threads and these these Focus areas all overlap budgeting is a huge part of curriculum review Cycles because you can't afford to replace all of your things all at the same time and we also have to keep in mind our Educators who are doing this we can't also ask them to do all new things all at the same time and so so you really need to have this cycle of um revision and review of your materials I could talk about it all day um but this is very important um also looking at just a published horizontally and vertically aligned curriculum PR prek to 12 what we're doing with our students is certainly shouldn't be a mystery to people and we want to have an an um accessible way for people if you are um someone who has a second grader in your life and you want to know about what a second graders learn about in social studies a way that you have um an accessible way to look into what the kids are learning about and the connections that it makes to our Frameworks the connections that it makes to the other things that they're learning about in their school and finally um a published data dashboard that we would consistently report progress on those are those sort of metrics that we're looking at to measure our students growth are the things that we're doing around teaching and learning yielding the results that we want them to to yield um and so you know again having a way that we can publish and access data for people to understand in a way um that shows how our students are growing so those are our measures of success our outcomes then the question becomes what do we do to achieve those again there are far more than just these three action steps under teaching and learning but three we'd like to elevate and lift up and talk a little bit more about tonight is developing that curriculum review cycle developing it but also implementing it a curriculum review cycle is a multi-year cycle because you have to first figure out where you are in the cycle with your curricular areas and then map out in a way that makes sense areas of priority that takes looking at data and making decisions about areas of importance um and then mapping that out um not just in our core curricular areas also to be clear we're looking at right we have new health and fed standards making sure that we have the resources that we need to be ble to implement new standards as they get updated um identifying piloting and implementing high quality research based curriculum materials we've talked a lot about making sure that we have research based highquality instructional materials in the hands of our teachers in the hands of our students and um assuring that we continue to make sure that they are culturally relevant up toate um and free of bias and finally identifying and developing a data dashboard related to student achievement so what is the data that we're going to use um I'll just in my very close world we brought foundations Integrity in to address um foundational reading skills right so looking at the Dibbles data is the data that's we're getting back which yes it is I'll talk more about that in another meeting giving us the results that we hope when we bring in materials to address with our students are they doing the things that we hope they would be doing and making sure that we are explaining to people when I talk about phone name seg if that's not the world you live in every day making sure people understand what that means and how it's important to students learning and so this is where I'm going to hand it over to Mrs dionio who will talk to you more about Focus area to I'm just going to come up and press all the buttons okay um focus area number two is safe and supportive schools so in this initiative we are looking um at how we are keeping students and staff physically safe in our buildings as well as the social emotional wellness and the sense of belonging which we know is crucial to learning so the initiatives in this Focus area reflect our commitment to building a capacity of staff and students to support the social emotional needs um of the students looking to research and evidence-based practices to identify culturally emotionally and intellectually affirming practices consistently across the district we're also looking to expand our before and after school program so that it exists at all levels not just at the middle school and high school aligning our safety um protocols and practices again across District consistently and really living out the one Dartmouth theme that is at the Forefront of this plan so it becomes more than just a logo on a t-shirt although it's a nice t-shirt um how do we know we will be successful so our Decap our district accommodation plan will um be robust and full of real um and effective interventions that help support all students um we'll have operational and well-funded consistently funded U before and after school program at the elementary middle and high school level and all our schools will be practicing um safety protocols within the district some of the things we're going to do um in order to get there um again with the evidence base looking at the evidence looking at the research that exists um to address the social emotional Wellness as well as how we're teaching kids and making sure that we're addressing the needs of all students um and then Jonathan is going to come up and talk a little bit more about the safety protocol which leads us to focus area three thank you Dr m t McGuire you found one way to get me off by holding the remote I did that's a good job so thank Youk I won't be able to thank you for recing give me the hook any time but as Lori said um the social emotional well-being of the of students and staff is Paramount but also there's some physical things that we need to do to keep people safe and they come in the form of intercoms and telephone systems and um security cameras as we maintain the um the relationship with the police department and the and the fire department and we talk about procedures and protocols U it's a good opportunity to ensure the safety and security of the schools could you uh just speak up a little bit I guess the back of the room's having a little bit of trouble or maybe Mr Pate can turn up the volume thank you oh that's better thank you so I actually was finished Mr Oliver but um but uh just talking about Safety and Security and the physical elements of that so that transitions uh next slide please oh I do it there we go the next slide talks about family and Community engagement um this speaks to initiatives uh such as communication a communication team uh committee as well as a communication plan uh complemented by items like a um a communication system called parents square that we've embraced to give messages throughout families it's the next level of communication for families because parent Square allows uh control by the individual to receive messages when it's convenient for them and which messages they receive so it it it makes it easier than being bombarded with uh messages throughout the day allows for that um as well as um a communication making communication smarter and uh more efficient as opposed to more communication just better communication those are some of the initiatives measure of success will be the survey Dr s McGuire did you want to mention that no you're doing oh great okay I can keep going sure um public and and um do the communication plan coming from the communication committee uh increase diversify engagement opportunities as you can see there um from all the town departments as I mentioned we've had our meetings with the police and fire talking about um communication and how to uh be better prepared together if there's an incident that we can work more flu ly and more efficiently and the action steps to those will be uh a survey that will go out to talk about that also the increasing uh promotion of parent square and the release which I'll talk about at the superintendent's uh report um of a new website that we've been working on feverishly in the background which will have most current information as well as um links to a lot of the things that people need for the district and that communication team will analyze the data to make sure we're communicating efficiently and and accurately so parents and family and Community uh are more informed and better informed thank you thank you Mr gashaw so um District strategic Plan Focus area four is budget and Capital Improvements so obviously in order to make this plan a success success we need to identify advocate for and Implement um resources that support the plan and support student achievement so the initiatives in this in this Focus area are to communicate and advocate for the instructional and operational needs of the district and to do the same for the facility and capital Improvement needs of the district some of the measures of success of some obvious things like a bud reflecting the needs of the district consistent and clear communication of the budget plan uh Capital Improvement plan reflecting the needs of the district and things like successful completion of capital Improvement projects and other initiatives some of the key action steps are to communicate the budget plan to all stakeholder groups to implement and monitor the effectiveness of the budget plan to develop a 10-year Capital Improvement plan reflecting our facility and capital needs right now we only have done a five previous to this um so we're going to expand that and to implement and complete Capital Improvement projects okay thank you and so here on this slide what you see is really a snapshot of the entire District strategic plan I remember I know a few minutes ago I talked about the theory of action as sort of being a synopsis or a summary of The District strategic plan um and in the same way this is this captures all of our um our strategic FOC our four strategic Focus areas of course it doesn't get into the initiatives the objectives the action plan but by looking at this uh snapshot or dashboard as we're calling it uh folks should get an idea of where we are going um as a d as the Dartmouth Public Schools over the next five years and something that I think is really important just to point out I mean our strategic Focus areas if you look across different District strategic plans across the state or even across the country you're going to see some similar Focus areas and that makes a lot of sense right that teaching and learning emerges as as a primary of area of focus because of course that's the work that we do every day that's the most important work that we do and yet we know without safe and supportive schools family and Community engagement and budget and Capital Improvements we can't get to the very work that's the most important work that that we do as an organization and that is in fact teaching and learning uh the other thing that I would say is important around core values and something that we we talk a lot about is pulling a core value out and talking about um whether it's uh it's it's inclusion inclusivity equity and and belonging you should be able to ask any one of us questions about how our organization is demonstrating a commitment through its core values to inclus inclusivity equity and belonging we should be able to speak to that um because we're espousing that as a core value and so how does that value exist in our organization and so again here what you're looking at is the dashboard of the entire strategic plan includes the mission the vision the values the Strategic Focus areas and really importantly the one Dartmouth and the pride right so we wanted to have symbolism that represented folks and what they shared with us about how they felt about being part of not only the Dartmouth Public Schools but the D Dartmouth Community uh so when we present something like this a strategic plan like this is the work that excites us as Educators I wish that there was like singing and dancing and that we could be up like have bright lights and and all of those uh fun things that people go to concerts for uh but I appreciate the folks that are here to listen to uh our presentation of the Strategic plan because really when you get into the details of the plan that's really where the work is and as you will have an opportunity because it will be published eventually once the committee approves it on our website you'll be able to get a very detailed uh you'll have the opportunity to have a very detailed view of what the entire plan looks like so things that again we're so incredibly proud of and we we started off the year at our converation talking about who we are and why not do the things that we do in terms of education and our commitment to our students and our community and one of the things that we're as you can see with our t-shirts one Dartmouth we want to move Beyond just a slogan you know we want to move to a real um a real commitment to the idea that we're one Dartmouth and for all of us as individuals to think through that lens of how we contribute to making sure that one Dartmouth is a reality and not just a slogan and every one of us has the responsibility to contribute to that culture and that belief system so you see on the um well not quite the first day but all our staff got there um we are we one Dartmouth t-shirts uh some and many of you got them this evening so we are one Dartmouth the kushman school we are one Dartmouth there's our Dello School staff um we are one Dartmouth there's your our parter Elementary School staff we are the Quinn Elementary School we are the Dartmouth middle school and we are Dartmouth High School and all of the Educators that are represented on the in these photos um from teachers to our esps to our custodians to our cafeteria workers to our lunch people that are serving our students lunch um to our security staff um so so many people are invested in the success of our school community and it's up to us to support them in the work they do through the implementation of a strategic plan but really when it comes to implementation the real work happens at the school level it happens at the classroom level and it happens between teachers and students and so again uh as we we made this we were like super excited about this presentation because that's what we do we're behind closed do going this looks great oh my God we're so excited and I see people looking going hm you know this is exciting but I hope you feel like the same kind of excitement that we actually have about this work moving forward and so with that um I've already talked about we are one Dartmouth I truly believe that we do have time for well are we do we have time for questions from the committee we do yeah well we also have discussion under new business for the uh it's up to the committee if we want to take it on right now or we also have it under new business discussion and vote on the district strategic plan and somewhere in there I want to throw in public comment so let's wait that that's fine whatever you want to do is fine what did you say I'm just thinking probably waiting for for that opportunity so if it's okay with a committee if we could just have the folks that are here come up and take a photo together and so that they they can if they choose to leave then they'll be able to do that we wanted to capture a photo though so these are our a some of our district strategic planning team members where we going you're going right here Ross is gonna organize [Laughter] us supposed to go to the other side on oh no we're not aren there people from the finance you know than see the top of my oh yeah so just hi that right underneath oh jeez thank you there it is let John oh sorry well before everyone leaves I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone that was part of the committee uh we're going to be discussing it in just a few minutes uh but for those of you uh leaving uh we know I I know for sure that it's taken a great amount of time to put this together there's a lot as well as a lot of planning a lot of cooperation and communication so uh thank you to all of those uh that were part of the strategic planning process uh next up under old business continuing discussion of the FY 26 budget and following this I'm going to uh insert the uh if it's okay with the committee I'm going to ins assert public comment uh so uh Mr Kylie thank you Mr Oliver so um you know it's the such a cyclical uh business with these these fiscal Years and we're working on the FY 26 budget as you know um we just finished the fiscal year 24 end of year report and I'll be reporting back to the committee at some point regarding um a report for the the end of the year it's actually um I I provided the full report to Mr Oliver for his uh review and and signature um it's so we're closing off fiscal year 24 we're living in 25 and we're preparing 26 um we have begun meeting with all the district administrators and department heads uh regarding the the fiscal year 26 budget um obviously you you know we we're just in the process of finalizing the Strategic plan here so um we're incorporating this strategic plan into our into our budget um and understanding what that impact is so we're working with the schools to do that now um we have a proposed budget subcommittee meeting for October 28th in which we would PR review preliminary uh budget numbers for fiscal year 26 so got a pretty pretty quick turnaround here in 3 weeks we've got to you know pull everything together from the Strategic plan and from uh our meetings with all the schools and present something to the budget subcommittee meeting on the 28th so that's that's where we are with budget at the moment thank you Mr Kylie questions no it's I'm going thank you for the update yeah thank you um I will just say I am available on the uh 28th I did see your email didn't have a chance to respond I did respond and I am aailable perfect thank you both so appreciate it look forward to seeing you on the 28th and as always thank you Mr Kylie for your diligence and the budget process uh next up before we get to new business I'm going to uh invite anyone wishing to speak on any of tonight's uh agenda items uh to do so at this time we've allotted approximately uh 10 minutes for any anyone wishing to comment on any of tonight's agenda items we just ask you to keep your comments brief um and approach the microphone I'm Bob gin chairman of the finance committee I'd like to thank you for all your hard work and doing this whole strategic plan uh I just have one question vertical and horizontal alignment of high quality research based curriculum what is that that's a great question that's a good so so just for the members of the audience uh we typically don't allow uh back and forth but because of the uh the cooperation that we're working with with the finance committee and tonight's uh um strategic plan uh we certainly will entertain questions from uh from the members of the audience it's a great question so vertical is K to 12 right so it's K12 so we want to make sure that all of our curriculum is aligned K12 aligned not only within the district but within the as far as the state standards are concerned so there are standards that are available not that you would want to go to the desie website and look at every single standard that exists but what we do do here in Dartmouth is we spend time um with our Educators and curriculum committees and with our teacher teams looking at what those standards are and aligning them not only again K to 12 but even as important if not more so um let's say across first grade right so that when you enter or you visit any first grade class in the Dartmouth Public Schools you should see that students are uh working on the same skills learning the same content using the same resources though that would be horizontally aligned vertically and again I'm going to talk K5 is you would expect to see uh for instance the district recently adopted uh Bridges which is the math resource and so you would expect to walk into and visit K5 classrooms whether it's the Dello the Quinn or the Potter School and let's say it's a fourth grade um you would expect to see the same resources being used across all of those fourth grade classrooms and in terms of the pacing of what's being taught at that time it should be within a range so that you can see that the kids the students across the district have access to the same content the same learning the same materials as any classroom in the district and you could we could say the same thing for middle school and we would repeat that for high school I mean High school can be a bit different because there are different contents being taught in in high school for instance math you might have an algebra class and a geometry class you would expect that there would be different content being taught in those classes okay all right thank you great question you're welcome thank you anyone else wishing to speak on any of tonight's agenda items all right I will take that as a that as a wrap and we'll close our public comment time uh next up under new business discussion and vote on the district strategic plan so we've now all had the opportunity some of our colleagues have had the opportunity right from the start to be part of the process but we certainly have had the chance to listen to the presentation this evening we all received it earlier this week uh in an email attachment uh so we could take a look at it ahead of time uh so thoughts comments questions from my colleagues I'll start over there on the other side of the table U Mrs Amaral thank you first I just want to say that was an excellent question Mr Goin took me still takes me time to think through okay what does that mean so thank you for asking it um for especially for all the people that really were afraid to ask because uh it's important um okay so I'm so supportive of this plan um I just from the beginning and in hearing from folks who were part of the committee and then hearing the report out of that committee um and I I'll just say like starting from being so intentional to think about um wanting all perspectives at the table and um making sure that students Educators the community were part of the process and also in being intentional about that recognizing that um there still are people who are are not at the table and being mindful about um that empty chair reference was really impressive um and just the investment in listening to others ideas um you know fears I'm sure I wasn't at that table you know I really was um uh you know John and uh beess can speak better to this but I I can only imagine like fears right questions come up in um as folks are thinking through what this might mean for um a plan with such large um impact potential impact um like that's against student voice and choice incredibly important and in my tenure on the committee I do not know that we have paid that much attention since I've been on the committee to that um as well as Rec I don't mean to look right at you just recognizing while we need to have the you know the supports and resources for our students it's equally important if not more important to have the resources and the tools for our staff um and threading that through the safe and supportive school right that um the mental health of our students mental health of our Educators um uh we're all in this together and that vision of making that generational connection I really look forward to seeing that come to fruition and look back you know 20 30 years from now to look back to say wow the impact that this plan made um because our students are going away and doing lots of different things whether they're going to college or going right into the workforce going into the military and coming back and wanting to be part of this community again and that retention um what that can mean for the town of Dartmouth um is is has has great potential so I'm I just That's so exciting and all the teaching and learning stuff feeling the passion and the commitment from all the folks that are coming up you talk about like the leadership team coming up um and just the incredible work that's being done behind the scenes and just the intentionality about what what does this look like uh how how many things can we change and what are on the plates of our students and our staff to make these changes and Scaffolding it and and and and building out a plan that's um you know may take a while to get there but we're going to get there because we have the end goal in sight so I that's all I'll add but um I am personally very uh excited about it and and just um enjoyed reading it and learning more about it um and every level it's just the thought and the commitment really comes through great that's it thank you very much Mr NS thank you Mr thank you Mr chairman uh yeah as one of the committee members that that was on this committee and thank you to Dr Sabre Maguire for putting me you asking me to be on this and you know in my tenure this is the first time I've sat in on one of these and uh it was personally a learning experience for me and I learned a lot from it uh my thanks to everyone that was on that committee uh I know I've kind of probably said this before but I'll say it again it was a great committee I mean Pam and Kathy did an outstanding job facilitating this and there was you you know the old adage you know no dumb questions type of deal but we sat there and we went through and you could ask a question uh about what was going on or if you changed an i to a Wii or whatever type of deal you know Mrs Pavo was our resident scribe changing literally changing things on the fly to uh to put it in to see what it looked like you know we get a thumbs up or a thumbs down you know and and and it was great to uh to have that uh the students that we had sit on this committee and I know again I've said it before unbelievable I mean they they were not afraid to put their two cents in believe me when I tell you that that you know they sat there if there was something they didn't like or they were they were not afraid to ask that question to make sure that they understood it and even in some of the folus groups that we were working on type of deal asking questions about things type of deal uh I wish Kathy was still here because I was just curious if they still had those four big sheets when we did these four focuses and you know the the first group going through each one would have been great but then the rest of us adding to it as as we went through was just unbelievable I mean when you sit here and you know that you know Kathy was right and and everybody's right you know the amount of time that went into it to to do this was just uh unbelievable but I think what we've got here is something to really be proud of and and to hang our hat on and you know I'm looking forward to seeing how this gets you know imp getting this implemented and and moving forward with it so my uh again my just my thanks to everyone that that participated in this uh this great piece of work I think for our students and our staff and our community this is something we can be very proud of I think um what I would say is this is an extraordinary effort um for from so many standpoints but but two that I would point out is such a large group and to focus such a large group is difficult to do um all of whom have different wants and needs and and agendas um so that is so impressive the second thing is to have accomplished this in such a short period of time having done a lot of strategic plans um in in my lifetime uh my working lifetime I it it this is very impressive so comprehensive um and you know I also know that for the folks that are from the school distri work in the school district it is hard to do your everyday job and to be also focused on the future and to go kind of go back and forth and um so I I compliment all of you and then for the folks from the community to bring this investment and this time commitment to this effort is um so appreciated uh and so important so um so this is just really impressive I'm very excited to watch um this be implemented and also to see to measure the metrics um and measure the accomplishments as we go through so thank you um so I also was on the uh committee and very grateful to be asked um it was a wonderful experience and yeah uh we can't emphasize enough how amazing it is to get you said 26 but I thought it was 27 37 37 37 people together um not be bickering moving forward um and though not bickering arguing over particular words because people cared so much I've never been part of such a large group that was so serious um and allowed everyone to have input so I I do think it's a great document um and I don't know I have like two little niggly things about it which um one is that we're not all teachers we're not all we don't know old the jargon so um in the theory of actions we assume that everyone knows what seel is engage in review of current seal curriculum through curriculum review cycle I just wish that we would write social emotional um learning there um because we want this to be an accessible document to the parents and to the community um and because we did argue over not argue well argue we discussed words disced and we thought words friendly discussion um that in the great letter at the front of the document um in the letter under the mission the word engaged is not used in the document the word inm mission in under mission is contributing it should be the same in both the letter and in the document yeah I miss that and oh you're talking about the the letter at the beginning of the okay got it just because I mean I feel like it's all part of the document good catch and I missed that we actually and then the other thing is core values in the letter of introduction um didn't did we change that I thought we did we t Okay so that wasn't part of the presentation no what you have in front of you is still in draft form and so we actually did you'll be happy to know we caught that the thing in Pride yes and we're making changes for the voice and choice thing yes we are doing okay yeah and um lastly in terms of accessibility to our greater Community which I'm part of um just in the document above the mission statement um we talk about exp poost facto data and I don't feel like that's a very accessible um phrase I feel that we should speak in a language that everyone understands um but I don't have a problem with it because I looked it up on Google and not that I could fully explain it to you but I got it we can make some we can make those changes that's um but it's great to know that is why it's in draft form it's not a published document so and this is what we're voting on so I wanted to bring that up um but it's great to know what we do why we do it and with where we want to be as a school as a community um so thank you to everyone who worked on it and thank you to all of those who will work on implementing it thank you very much yeah I will I will also uh Echo and agree with um I think throughout this uh I think it would help a lot of us are at the table and in the room are probably familiar with some many of the acronyms that are used in education um but for the general public I think it may be helpful to to spell it out for everyone so that that would be my only uh my only recommendation as far as uh editing goes uh I will say that um you know what else is there to say uh I think it's important that we we recognize uh uh for those those people that are watching at home or will watch that this document is a product of months and months of collaboration between multiple stakeholder groups uh from town officials parents students community members um as well as members of the administration team instructional team and school committee um I'm excited for one that we finally uh have I feel some some substance planned with some substance um to move forward with and build our uh our future our our next five years and not only that but as we go to um town meeting or we go to um other meetings uh with Town officials uh we certainly have a why as to why why we need this why we're doing this um so I think it helps and I think this is something that our instructional Professionals in the classrooms uh certainly uh uh will be grateful for um our our teachers are educational support professionals um you know I I think this puts some some substance behind uh what we're doing in this district and really how how are we going to take this District to the next level um and I personally would love to see I know we're a great District or I should say we're we're exemp we're an extremely good District um and I think we have some potential there to uh to move it up a notch um it'll take some work and some effort uh but I'm excited for the future so um thank you Dr sa McGuire thank you um thank you to everyone else uh that was part of this team and I look forward to uh seeing where this goes uh at this time if there's any other questions yeah thank you Mr chairman just taking a step back with what uh be said about some of the pneumonics type of deal maybe uh a page with all the abbreviations and what they actually stand for yeah we can do a key you know a key in there type of deal so that they would you know people be able will know what they're looking at just a thought yep we can do that other than that I'm fine perfect at this time the chair will entertain a motion uh to approve the district strategic plan Mr chairman make a motion that we approve the uh School District achievement plan for school year 2024 to 2029 as presented with the necessary small Minor Adjustments second so we have a motion by Mr Nunes a second by Mrs Amaral on the motion any further discussion J hearing none all in favor I I opposed motion carries unanimously great that's wonderful news thank you so much and again thank you so much to the committee for all your support because you have been giving us ongoing Support over the past really seven months that we've been working on this well thank you and I also like to before they leave thank our members of our our finance committee for joining us here this evening uh we did extend an invite uh to the uh finance committee as well as the select board select board was in session this evening but we certainly appreciate uh those of you that were able to make it uh next up uh school committee policies section A foundations and basic commitments first reading Mr Kylie are you going to jump in on that you have it right there in front of you yep I can start us off so um so we have begun our ccal review of policies um we are planning to bring forward a policy section every of every other month to you um attempt to bring forward a full section as best we can um and I'll talk about some specifics that go along with that as we uh as we get through this so we've we've brought um policy section A which is called which is called foundations and basic commitments um to you this evening so the school committee um so the the administration um met in August and early September to review these policies the policies in section A um and then brought them to a school committee policy subcommittee meeting on September 16th um at which time we agreed to bring them forward we had discussion about them and agreed to bring them forward to you folks for a first read tonight so I'll walk you through um what you um what you have before you in your packet was um a little summary statement that I wrote um but then a summary page that shows the all the policies in section a um their policy title and what the recommended actions were for those so hopefully that's helpful to sort of organize um as we go through this we'll hopefully continue to you know continue to do that for each policy section that we're able to tackle um the first policy for which we're recommending A change is policy ad which is Mission statement obviously tonight we've uh you've now agreed that we have a new mission statement so that's timely um it this this policy ad revision is reflective of that I included uh both the prior policy in your packet as well as the um as the revised policy really didn't make a lot of sense to redline the old policy since all of the words changed from one to the other so I just included the old one um for your review in case you you know wanted to see what see what it looked like prior to this um so that's the that is the first policy and I guess if there's any questions about that or things we want to talk about discussion we could could do that now I think policy ad is uh pretty straightforward Bas um yes easiest one so once again the mission statement in the new school policy does not reflect the mission St statement in our new strategic plan um again that word contributing instead of engaged um I don't know why it's contributing um but say contributing yeah but in the it should say engaged it should say engaged because I know what you're saying I know what she saying I know what she's saying in the Strategic plan the mission statements says informed oh no oh that was for the other one never mind okay so at the beginning in the mess forget that that was for the other one okay um together with student staff families and Community is what the policy says and the mission statement where's the broader Community okay I'm confused I think I'm mixing things up local and Global Community we we can certainly the broader somewhere we say broader community and other and then other places we say community MH um might be in the letter oh it's in the letter so it's not the policy but it's back to the letter oh okay that the word broader is inserted okay I just want them to both both a letter to be to be aligned aligned yep so we're going to make that change and make sure that's reflected in the policy as well right okay that was it because it is straightforward and I'm cool with that I was getting the letter and um the policy mixed up as long as you're cool with it okay so since this this is a first read we're not asking you know anyone to to vote on anything tonight so um the next policy for which we're recommending A change is policy add background checks so similarly to mission statement this is a full rewrite um the old policy is from 2012 so it's been a bit um in 2012 the whole fingerprinting um process that we're required to do now didn't even exist so it's it's about time we we get up to speed here and and update that policy um we I I will say that I can assure you that operationally we have complied with what this proposed policy is um and I I've been here since then you know since that was implemented and I can say that we are com in compliance with um with the Department of Criminal Justice um guidelines and and this policy so this policy reflects actually practice as it current ly exists so if you have any questions on that be happy to field them questions on ADD remember this is just a first reading anyway yeah okay thank you Mr Kylie okay thank you uh so the next policy we ask you to consider is a brand new policy so add is uh the reflective of the Department of Criminal Justice Information Services model policy so masc recommended that U this policy be included in addition to add which you just took a look at um in order to make sure that we we are specific in regards to our process and that in the instance that the Department of Criminal Justice were to um audit our our process we would have regulations procedures in place that reflected exactly what they're looking for so um based on that recommendation of masc it made sense to add this policy that that previously didn't exist questions cut and dry sounds wise think it makes sense okay so um those are the policies that we're asking you to revise or change but I just wanted to fill you in because um there were some other policies in section A that um first of all there were some policies in section A that were identical to the masc um policies um and did not you know require a change from us some policies that you know were currently in place that that made sense but there were some that uh we have not brought forward yet so the policies that relate to um the title 9 process and discrimination and harassment uh on the advice of our legal council so there's there's some in court injunctions at the moment relating to those policies um so at the advice of our Council they have been revising recommended policies um in the background waiting for these injunctions to to clear up so that uh we can move forward with revised policies so at this point um those are sort of on hold uh on the advice of council we have one other policy ADF which is the school district wellness program uh which we have a wellness Committee in the district you may or may not know um and they meet four times a year and are um going to take a look at this policy they' did some work last year on it and uh are going to take a take a look at that prior to bringing it forward to the to the policy subcommittee for revision so those are that's where we stand with policy section a um again if if there's anything that comes up that you think of prior to bringing it forward to you know for a vote we'd be happy to revisit that um we are this month um going to be working on policy section B internally so that we can move it forward um with a policy subcommittee meeting scheduled for tentatively scheduled for November 18th for Section B section B is school committee and government operations it's extensive um so it's it's some heavy some of the heavier lifting that we will be doing uh in this in this process but we're going to dig in and get it done so well I certainly appreciate appreciate everything you tackling this Mr Kylie and just as a reminder this was just a first read we'll bring these back for a final vote and thank you to our policy subcommittee all right moving right along superintendent update thank you Mr Oliver um Mr Kylie did you want to start with the update on town meeting sure why not I'm you're roll at the moment right uh so we just wanted to give you a quick update uh so we had received word from the capital Improvement planning committee um that several of our requests uh were approved to be placed on the town meeting warrant um technology Hardware replacement for $300,000 bathroom Renovations for $150,000 interior and exterior painting for $75,000 Energy Efficiency projects for $120,000 music equipment for $65,000 and generate a replacement at the Quinn school for $150,000 so a a good a good number of projects we're obviously thankful um for their support and look forward to completing these projects some of which we'll be able to do you know start right away and um you know after approval and and and get those underway the the two uh projects which were not um approved as this at this time were the high school track reconstruction which to be honest we wouldn't have been able to do in the winter anyway that that part of it um and it's not my my understanding from speaking with um some folks on the capital Improvement planning committee it's not that they don't support that it's that uh they wanted to consider there's some other projects in town that may be able to D be done um at the same time playground projects that um we're going to take a look at and see if vendors can complete uh if one vendor can complete multiple projects and and so my understanding is that this will be that'll be considered in the spring the other thing that didn't receive funding is the stadium renovation project at this time but so but again we're thankful for uh for for all the support that we've gotten in terms of getting some of these things done so no agreed thank you for the update questions thank you sir thank you to thank you to CIP is there any design work that's involved with the track that could be done ahead of time or so very very basic design work it really it would be by the design by the the construction company can do design and build so that's hopefully it's not a it's not a time consumer no okay no it should be able to be if we do receive funding at the beginning of June depending on how many other tracks get scheduled before us um we hopefully could get it done over the summer all right thank you Mr Kylie so I'll just jump right back in um so again with the approval of the uh District strategic plan part of the way that we want to share with you our progress toward meeting with success is through the way that we structure our reports uh to you uh through the superintendent report and and just other opportunities to report out to you uh so that it isn't just um a once or twice a year opportunity for you to hear about the progress that we're making um part of the way that we have structured our superintendent report is with that in mind with not necessarily being as intentional about it um so as we move forward we'll be more intentional about tying what we're reporting out through whether it's the superintendent's report or presentations back to how that connects to the Strategic plan and so with that under teaching and learning again I'm just going to mention it's just a brief update on our mcast performance you can see that dth week did a story and so um we really appreciate that that they're actually taking the time to really look into and have conversations with us about where we are in terms of of our mcast performance so um as you could see the results have had both highs and lows and we plan on doing a detailed uh presentation at one of our November or at our November I think there might only be one uh school committee meeting but some key points that I think are worth sharing tonight first we're incredibly proud to announce and you've saw it in the Dartmouth week uh article that the Quinn school has been recognized as a school of recognition I see Dr Thomas is here tonight um and want to congratulate Dr Thomas and I also see M pareses here and we had a celebr a at the Quinn school last week we plan on coming out we were supposed to be there um just you um I I didn't have my clock um calibrated properly um but we will be out to celebrate with you uh because again we're incredibly proud of the work that that you did and it's quite a distinction the honor is based on the school's exceptional progress toward meeting its own goals and again when we come out and when we present present to you in November we'll talk more about how what metric that is used to make that determination but the Quinn was one of 27 schools I mean 57 schools across the state to be recognized so congratulations to the faculty and again all involved uh with supporting the Quinn school and at the same time I want to say uh that there's hard work happening across the entire District we could certainly see that in um our mcast scores and mcast are not is not the only data point we're using to assess our students progress uh so again lots of great work happening for example as you saw 55% of our students districtwide met or exceeded expectations in math and science and that was an 11% increase over last year and that's a districtwide accomplishment so again the hard work that goes into that by our teachers and our staff members uh cannot be underestimated uh we are just about returned to our and and you hear the state and at the national level them referring to pre 20109 preco achievement so we're right about there in math um and in some cases we've even exceeded our 2019 results and we also recognize that there's much work to do we can see that in literacy we are seeing increasing achievement and at the same time we can see that we have not yet reached not we haven't even gotten back to 2019 achievement results and it's a pretty significant Gap and that's work that we're doing and again tying it back to the district strategic plan you can hear again Mrs Pavo up here talking about teaching and learning prek to 12 research based horizontal and vertical alignment research-based high quality resources and as we've said all along it really is the responsibility of the school district to provide to to provide those resources to our Educators and to our students um so we'll again be presenting to you in November a more detailed overview of mcast scores across the district as far as Personnel um under again HR budget Capital Improvements Mr Kylie already spoke to but um we are are excited to share with you that we do have a new yet experienced Behavior specialist who's going to be starting with us on October 28th and so we're excited about being able to find somebody and it's just you know that we we waited we are patient and we believe that um I know Mrs denisia would agree that we believe that we found the right person to help support our teachers and our students with their social emotional learning needs that's sell Mrs so I'm trying to weave that in that's good I appreciate that yes so um that's something we're excited about uh where I'm pretty sure we're on boarding that halftime PE Health position and so we're still searching for a person for the facilities department and another real area of challenge for us is the elll teacher that we need to share between the English language acquisition teacher that's what that position you're welcome um so uh we are not the only Community across the state that is struggling to find the appropriately licensed Personnel for that particular position but we are working toward and hope to share with you soon what we are doing in lie of because we're we have to take action because our students right now need to be getting the direct Serv services that are that they're entitled to so we are going to have to um probably bring in uh a teacher somebody who's got a certification but not necessarily that elll certification but at the same time support them to best meet the needs of the students who do need to be provided direct service um so other than that we're in we're in pretty good shape um we still all you know what I'm going to say monitors substitute teachers esps Food Service workers all those folks are as I said earlier everybody that has one of those roles no matter what role you have in the district you're critical to the operation of our school district and to supporting our students uh so we're going to keep working on that and I again thank K Kate for her uh commitment to that and working and on boarding people on uh really on what is a pretty um constant basis uh so pretty we're in good shape Mr Kylie already talked about Capital Improvements did you have anything else you were you were good um so the other thing that I want to tie back to the district strategic plan is our effort our our efforts to strengthen communication throughout the district uh just recently as a matter of fact just last week myself and a group of Dartmouth Educators including Mr gashaw had the opportunity to participate in a parent Square Summit um it was people were really from all over the country but I'm pleased to share that we learned quite a bit and we look forward to employing parent Square's many features the beauty of having a big group from a representation across the district is everybody has a different role a different perspective and ways in which we can utilize parent Square to be even more effective than it already is and so again back to the district strategic plan Mr gashaw is going to talk about the efforts with parent square and talk about where we are with our website thank you as Dr s McGuire mentioned um the parent Square uh we're all in on the parent Square software um I had do Mr Chris foi Dr TBO Dr s Maguire and two instructional tech people came learning different methods of how to use it for communication I put the founder of the soft software together with Mr christop Foy so in a room for an hour to discuss how the software can better serve Athletics and coaching and the communication of that they were both excited um I think the the developer uh got some free um Consulting of how to where to go and Mr Chris Foy felt like he was going to make changes to the software so it's wonderful um but so we can increase communication better communication and that parents and and students can have control of that communication so you can find find out what you want to know when you want to know it and all that you want to know about the district Again part of strategic planning and communication uh as I mentioned quickly before uh we are uh developing a new website uh we've been going through painstakingly going through def every Link in the old website finding old documents and broken links and such so we have a Target date of the end of the month October 29th we're in the process now of trying to redirect all the um the domain name controllers that are out there in the in the internet to go in the direction of the news site so that'll be something we'll be working with uh the um those companies to do so uh we still are it's an ongoing thing it'll always be it will never be done because it's there's always new information always changing information but we're excited about that so as a as a good foundation of things like calendars and menus and and um bus routes and things like that the the what the parents need what the families need to have that base of information and then the ongoing information will come from parent Square the dynamic information so that's exciting both on those two fronts um I just want to add quickly off of what Mr Ki said I am currently reviewing the I policies that's information so down the road we'll be doing that after I've cleared them through the technology committee as well as the policy committee so we're recommitting the technology committee to look at that so I'll be asking two members of the school committee who have assigned to the technology committee to find um possible dates uh do you know who the other person is Mr Oliver you're one of them I believe it's just me that oh just so far always love to have two people is it just you I'd love to have two I thought there was two I'm fine with that I'm sure it's written somewhere we can look it up but yeah we we can look at it later I'm in I'm in that be got your second I won't accept three that's a quorum and I won't accept that so we'll just have two so that's good uh I don't want that responsibility of having a quorum but uh we will do that probably in the month of October to take a look at some ongoing things right now and the changes are coming but then later of course to look at the policies so we can present to the policy committee which will then probably get you a meeting if it's every other month Mr K will'll probably be more like May by the time we get to I so that's good that was good that's quickly thank you didn't want to take up too much time great job thank thank you Mr gashaw Okay so next I'd like to give you an update as to um how we're doing with our Dartmouth High School internship program and again Mr parate provided me with this information and I want to tie it back to District strategic plan and do that in the way of saying you know this is an example of giving students more opportunities through voice and choice and hearing what kinds of excuse me opportunities they'd like to engage in and so uh 90 students have enrolled to start the school year and more are expected next semester and that will bring us to about 100 or more students in this year's program and that increases participation from last year which was around 94 students so the Highlight is that the quality and visibility of the program has obviously resonated with our students but again strategic plan we have been able to partner with organizations local and Regional to expand the network opportunities for our students uh for example um through again Mr pate's leadership we built out a program with South Coast Healthcare to include 10 opportunities for Health Care students uh across St Luke's Charlton Memorial Hospital uh he's Mr AA is working with Dave mccre president and chief executive officer of South Coast Health uh we opened the program last year and again students are going through an orientation process and they are going to have an opportunity to work across these Health Care organizations in preparation for what they want to do After High School uh additionally this year uh we were able to welcome several local establishments again through Mr pate's advocacy including Chase Farm vet Veterinary Hospital Kia of Dartmouth Alden Court Nursing and Rehabilitation Center Center the cas and Pig Restaurant I Health Vision Center and mados and Suns construction so more opportunities for students to get out into their community and experience internships that will help to inform them as to what their next steps are uh B Bay Coast B uh Bank Grant was we were awarded a $1,250 um appropriation to renovate one of our computer science labs at the high school and use those funds in donor Choice which match the donation so you know Mr parate is really good at finding match donations and so there is $2500 worth of new technology soon to arrive and be installed in the new lab so thank you to Bay Coast Bank for that our dhsv media studio uh students are working with the Bristol County Sheriff's Office to produce criminal justice PCA commercials to support and Spotlight the local public relations of their program and uh actually it's just passed but Captain Raposa presented to the media students uh just to start the production process this is gives them an opportunity to be engaged in a real world production for their students and maybe even do some on-site filming and so thank you to Mr parate who I know is going to be sharing more good news coming out of the uh the high school media Studio because they're doing lots of really great work I know I talked to Mrs Amaral recently and I know even her daughter May is now involved in the um the broadcasting of the local high school news show so as far as uh you know what's going on out in the district this past week uh we were engaged in school visits in schools all the time but as I've shared with you on a bimonthly basis we're in there for a very targeted business uh I mean visit and so we've been out in schools and classrooms and for our first visit it was really about engaging teachers and conversation about how the school year is going um really how was the start of your very simple how was the start of your school year if you had a positive start are there things that we can do to support you and I am pleased to share that there there is an overwhelming sense of positivity across the school district and we've been in all of our schools that's not to say that we don't have challenges because we do but the positive energy that our Educators that our school leaders have brought to the start of the school year has been truly impressive and I was so happy to walk through classrooms and schools just this past week so was only this so we're couple weeks into the school year and just to be able to um be get a sense of climate and culture in our schools and that I would say I would attribute that feeling to every one of the schools in our school district uh as far as the community engagement piece again going back to District strategic plan so I'm being very intentional about saying this tonight I won't always District strategic plan I won't always do that but I just want to make sure that we're making those connection between the work that we're doing and what exists in our strategic plan because everything in a sense that we report out to you you should be able to tie back to our strategic plan and so Community engagement is truly important to us I met with Dena St Pierre she is the director of Library Services here in Dartmouth and we're pleased with the individual uh Outreach that schools have with the local library and at the same time we recognize ize that there's room for us to strengthen our relationship and our partnership and just for one uh this spring what we will be working toward with our elementary schools is uh that all of our fifth grade students will visit the library either the is it the sou Southworth Southworth Library and then the newer Library dmouth um so we will have a a field trip opportunity for them to go to the library to receive a library card and while that happens like the Potter has easy access right in some cases the Dillo has easy easier access um and then we have the Quinn which is a little bit off the beaten path so we want to make sure that not really off the beaten path I mean you're right in the middle of everything actually the Quinn school but we know that the Quinn school isn't located in close proxim imity to one of our libraries so we are going to make sure that we provide a way for our students to be able to access the library so that's just a start um and we look forward to being able to grow those kind of Partnerships so that they become embedded in what we do um because I so appreciate what the schools do and but and we want those individual efforts and at the same time we want to systemize things so that they happen regardless of the IND individual that is sort of reaching out to the library or any other organization and just again stealing from the Monday minute but goes along with what we're talking about in terms of community engagement um our cheerleader coach Rebecca Braga the chair program she was if you remember last year our cheerleaders visited the Dartmouth Council on Aging and they participated in their weekly dance class they did that again this past Friday and so by all accounts the student athletes had a great time and uh the senior citizens that were part of that experience they were excited they expressed their appreciation toward the girls and it it's a great example again of community service Outreach in Partnership and we're looking forward to welcoming them to our uh October 18th football game so if you remember we did that last year so now we want to see those kind of uh opport opportunities just become embedded in what we do every year um and so I I know our student representative talked about what was going on with uh Sports you know the football team they came back after dropping their first game I'm so happy to see that they were it sounds like it was a great win um we also have our field hockey team uh that just supported that just uh participated in community outreach supporting Morgan message which is about raising awareness about suicide prevention so we have again the field hockey team engaged in that kind of community work and and we owe that to our coaches who are taking those steps to ensuring that we have that type of community outreach so those are the things we're going to keep building off of and as we come and Report out to you what what is our progress we'll be able to say to you as a committee to the public well here is where we are in terms of building Community Partnerships here are some um of the uh just some of the successes we've had so we're excited to continue that kind of work and I think that's all I have there's certainly a lot going on there is a lot of exciting things thank you for that update questions from my colleagues good Mr noon just just one thank you uh Mr chairman uh Dr sa Maguire you talked about the interns and that's great what grades does that Encompass do you are you do you know what grad it's the seniors just the seniors okay thank you and Mr noones I want you to know that I'm keeping myself from talking about the band because I learned that last year no you're fine no I'm good it's not all about me no I'm good well the band is all about you no it's not it's the kids it's the students kids Yes the band reporting out on the band at school committee okay thank you very much uh just an update just curious who will be attending the uh Mas masc joint conference uh will we have four of us uh that's all right I've been before the only reason why I ask is um I'm just trying to get the committee's feel on whether or not you would be interested or if anyone's going to be around on Friday afternoon for the delegate assembly in which uh the school committee uh here at the table maybe at the next meeting we take up all the uh ma SC resolutions and then we'd vote on them and then we'd elect a delegate to attend um the delegate assembly where you would uh vote uh on behalf of the doas school committee uh around along with all the other school committees in the State um so before I go and you know waste everyone's time uh on uh debating these resolutions at our next meeting um I believe if I were to look it's not until Friday afternoon the delegate assembly um and that's at 3:15 I'm there Friday so I can do it oh you can do you'd be willing you'd be willing to do it good is it long is that like a really long thing I cannot answer that uh as I've never been uh as a delegate uh but I would nobody no but I would it's just something that I you know I think I I'd love to see the D school committee um you know have a voice yeah thank you sure thank you for that so um we'll look I might be texting you at 9:30 p.m.

to noon um I'm sure this has impacted many people dis red driving is definitely an issue I'm gonna you know me I'm GNA add Li did you know right did you know that the number two language of instruction in American schools prior to World War I was actually German it was the second largest uh instructional language prior to World War I my own grandfather in Kendall County uh he was uh made it to fifth grade and uh and then um since they spoke German at uh at home that was a that was a hindrance I say this all because it is German American heritage month and our German student program has shared several ways everyone can join in the learning and celebration check out the district's Facebook page for a link to their materials congratulations to the panther marching band who were third in their class and third overall out of 18 bands at the Downers Grove Mustang music bowl over the weekend I happen to be there to uh witness it they're just going out of order it's okay go ahead Dominic and I switched they just went out of order I I happen to be part in an accident with distracted driving and and I happened to be at the at Downer South this week it's all good there you go anyway going for [Laughter] therapy I want crazy let's just [Laughter] leave' I have um I wanted I wanted to um particularly um on behalf of myself congrat congratulate um the O marching band um yes they they their presentation is probably a little bit less than traditional which I found um which I found pretty awesome actually um and they had some really tough competition out there it was a beautiful night it was a great day to sit and watch bands and um again third overall out of 18 out of 18 marching bands so congrats to them do should I go you can go now unless you guys have switched very seriously parent Cafe a safe space for parents or caregivers navigating the challenges of Parenthood will meet for the first time this school year on Wednesday October 23rd register for the in-person meeting held at the asgo public library Montgomery campus from 10: to noon or a virtual meeting from 6:00 p.m.

for grade 1 through five 1 through six 10 blasts at 645 for high and grade schools I was on the school committee for three years back in 2000 and whatever early 2000s and I did not know that they were still doing this and my I had my daughters outside waiting for a bus one day and there was no school and they're like Mom how did you not know that and it's a history of the Town up until then let's see what can we find anything interesting oh oh this will be fun there's a comment about the liquor problem towns incorporation up to 1885 there was from time to time considerable agitation regarding the question of liquor licenses and liquor sales but the sentiment of the town was always strongly in favor of no license [Music] well that wraps up another Ashlin day 2024 it's a bit of a rainy day but there were still people out and about we were still able to celebrate our Grand Marshal who is Senate President Karen spilka and our resident of the Year citizen of the Year Rob St Germaine so it was fun it was wet but a lot of groups were still here hopefully you had the opportunity to share and participate in Ashen day as well so I'm Yolanda Greaves and for around the clock that wraps up Ashland day 2024 happy Ash day have you gone up in this leag before no I am no ready to Heights what are you I'm ready to go anytime so won't say that I'm up there with you okay y

to 1:00 p.m. at the ashin community center parents are encouraged to bring their child's car seat for safety inspections some voting information with the November election approaching the town clerk's office is preparing for the event and the special town meeting here are some key dates to remember inperson early voting October 19th to November 1st with specific times for each day last day to register to vote 5:00 p.m. on Saturday October 26th the town clerk's office will be open for registrations last dat a request a vote by mail ballot 5:00 p.m. on Tuesday October 29th 9 election day Tuesday November 5th at Ashlin High School from 7:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. a special town meeting Tuesday November 19th at 700 p.m. also at Ashland high school now department Spotlight the Ashland human resources department the latest episode of inside Ashland explor exploring local government highlights in the human resources department it focuses on how this department supports ashlin's Workforce ensuring that employees feel valued and are equipped to serve the community effectively facts and polls last week's poll results a poll about participation in the comprehensive plan survey revealed that 27 people completed the survey while six did not The Envision ashin comprehensive plan will serve as a 10-year road map for the town's future guiding decisions on growth and preservation additional public engagement opportunities will be available Community Shout Out Mr Josh wixer col for his dedication as a math teacher and student council co-advisor Mr wixer significantly impacts ashin students in the community he is involved in events like Ashlin day and pumpkinfest and helps connect students with volunteer opportunities his positive spirit and hard work make him a valuable asset to the Ashland Public School System in the community and I personally can attest to that shout out nomination form residents are encouraged to nominate individuals who contribute positively to Ashland upcoming Mee meetings residents can stay informed about local governance by attending meetings which can be viewed as town hall or remotely via waca TV here are some upcoming meetings October 88th sustainability committee at 7 p.m.

what did you get me what did you get me into um you know uh certainly if if you have to leave you have to leave but uh no that sounds good and then this way it gives us the opportunity to hash out some of these uh resolutions that masc has put forward for consideration so if we could maybe add that uh we um when I meet with uh our superintendent um to plan out the agenda we'll make sure to add that to the next school committee agenda uh last but not least just to reminder uh that and I'm guilty of this I have uh according to my calendar two days left uh to submit the superintendent's evaluation uh to Kathleen Amaral or and and or Mr noons or you just send them to you can just send them to send them to Kath and I sit we'll send them uh to Kathleen and the intention is to present uh the full committee's evaluation at the October 21st School committee meeting that's right soy we have a correct me if I'm wrong we we have a zoom meeting scheduled Dr saber Maguire on the 18th at noon time that Friday to to go over it with Youk yeah no fine I'm good all right Y and that is all I have um turn it over to my colleagues go ahead I I just wanted to put a plug uh quickly um Miss Mrs Den had mentioned this last meeting but October 15th which is before we next meet um which is a week from tomorrow at the James Quinn School the uh Dartmouth special education parent advisory Council will be meeting and um it's twofold it is uh the we're required every year to present on parents gardenian rights so we'll be doing that and we always make room for Q&A but also to encourage and welcome uh other Guardians and caregivers to take the lead on this important um uh activity that is uh stamped in Massachusetts regulations were required to have a special parent advisory Council um I'm here but I'm uh I'm recognizing right there's some we need some younger um no experience necessary the requirement is to have a student uh who uh receives special education services um and the um sort of the p i an encouraged perspective that it's not about your child it's about all children who are receiving services so it allows you sort of that overarching perspective to think about not what's only not what's good about good for my child there certainly value and getting to connect with the school department regularly and learn more about the laws but really to think about how can I volunteer to make an impact um for all students in our town who are receiving special education services um and if anyone has any questions they certainly can reach out to me but I encourage everyone to stop by Quinn on October 15th at 6:00 to learn your rights and sign in the dotted line and take over this one F role that I've been filling since 2012 I think so um the more the merrier that's all I have thank you Mrs Amal Mr NES yeah thank you Mr chairman uh yeah the band uh last Saturday we were at dery high BMC dery High School uh for the US band competition uh students scored a 90.5 in division 4 uh which was the number one the high score for the evening uh gave them first place in that uh division uh they walked away with all all the captions uh except for color guide so they had a a great night uh we're in King Phillip uh this uh Saturday night up in rentham and then uh the following week which is October 19th is our home show um starting at 6 PM in the evening uh we've got 13 bands lined up to perform uh that would put dmouth on somewhere probably about 9:15 you know and again they haven't come out with the times yet so uh what I will do is get a an email out this week to uh Dr Sab Maguire you Mr Oliver and to Mr Shay at the high school looking to see if anyone's available to uh a representative to uh help with the uh trophy presentations and awards at the end of the night so I will do that so uh the gates will open at 5:30 and we'll be good to go is it 19th 19th I'm sure I can but I'll let you know yeah yeah that the more the marer and that's October October 19th all right thank you very much anyone else nothing for me no all right let's get back over to the agenda with that uh the next regularly scheduled meeting of the adou school committee is scheduled for Monday October 21st 2024 right here in the dmouth high school media center uh do we do we have an executive session tonight do not I didn't think so okay perfect so please disregard that on the agenda that was put there in the event we needed it um and I do remember having the conversation just wanted to confirm uh there will be no executive uh session this evening so with that chair will'll entertain a motion to adjourn so moved second motion by Mr noon second by Mrs Amaral on the motion any further discussion chair hearing none all in favor I I opposed motion carries unanimously meeting is adjourned thank you everyone good night oh you f that was good good stuff good stuff great thank you [Music] Chris e

to 7:30 p.m. visit the district website to sign up congratulations the sgo co-op girls golf team on winning the ihsa Regional Championship last month team member Annabelle Williams got a hole in one at Blackberry Oaks the first in program history that's awesome pretty sweet in other golf news at the at today's sectional event OE boys golfer Logan Hong secured his spot at State congratulations [Applause] nice yesterday was National coaches day and we want to thank the hardworking coaches who dedicate their time guidance and unwavering support to our student athletes across the district your guidance extends beyond the playing field shaping our student athletes into confident strong individuals thank you for all you do World teachers day was on Saturday around the globe and here in our schools teachers instill knowledge and a love of learning in the hearts and the minds of young people we thank all teachers for their selfless service to our future Generations okay all right now we're moving on to 7.2 and we will have our student board members reports from Hope rier and Callie Parnell take it away so just kidding okay so the meeting commenced on Wednesday with the brief from conversation among among attendees allowing a to become acquainted subsequently two students prepared data from the previous year which included various surveys I don't feel yeah could you start over just got jumble there we go Come a Little Closer all right there you go hello so the meeting commen with the brief conversation among attendees allowing everyone to become acquainted subsequently two students presented data from the previous year which included various surveys conducted among students and teachers regarding their perceptions of one another from the analysis we conclude that this year our emphasis will be on enhancing the student teacher Dynamic and relationship following the presentation the students were divided into three groups to acknowledge process and brainstorm new action steps aimed at transforming the vision into a reality our ideas of the action steps were documented on large poster boards and Rel discuss with the group after everyone came together again and hope we'll talk about the action steps and highlights from it okay so these are our highlights and our action steps so we have our students and teachers fill out forms that describe what they consider disrespectful Behavior then discuss in these class to ensure everyone understands each other's views especially with the phone issue that we have in our uh classes so we want to just send out a form so that teachers and students can have a relationship about that and understand each other's point of view and then re-evaluating the definitions and protocol of a check-in with your students um and then make them more personal and engaging and have more of a lency because I feel like our students need to have more of a trust to our teachers and our Educators and then I said incorporating a single day each week dedicated to fostering a teacher student bonding activity is essential to instill confidence in students regarding their Educators and I said that this Innovative um this initiative can progressively develop into a foundation of trust between the parties involved thank you oh and to add on to that oh so yeah Wednesday we briefly talked about um some of the things that are what are they called again like what are the what is the group called No the group called SS Comm student advis s yes yes that's talking about um they uh talked about many issues uh one issue that they really brought up was the phone policy um teachers uh consider a little bit disrespectful for students to have their phone in classes however students feel as though uh that's their property and they shouldn't have it revoked away from them so kind of mediating between uh teachers and students would kind of have a healthier lesion between them I guess it's causing a little bit of division especially at OE particularly cie can speak on o but um it's kind of causing some Division and like interference um a point that I made that I didn't want to be like Devil's Advocate but I was like uh teachers also have test scores that they need to submit and if students are on their phones or seem distracted when those scores come in and students aren't doing well because they were on their phones we're going to look at it as oh uh was a material that was being taught was were students understanding the material okay if they were understanding the material then what was the what was the root course of them not testing well um or doing well on these tests so that's something that I mentioned um and they took into initiative about how I mentioned that topic and they stated that okay I understand that portion however how do we create a safe place for students to feel that they can turn in their phones um if that's necessary um and some ideas that were brought up is maybe phone on desk not touching it if so what happens what procedur is taken after um and issues like that and celly can speak more about about that um actually feel that was a great way for me to start off my conversation because when we're talking about the phones and how like oh saying them on the desk this will help with this this will help with this I feel like a main a major problem is the perception of what students and teachers students and teachers see throughout the classroom and how students lack the sympathy and empathy Prospect when it comes to teachers so I feel like a when I have wrote down my first highlight saying have students and teachers fill out forms that describe what they consider disrespectful than discussing in these classes I feel like discussing it is just one step but I feel like to take it a step further is actually demonstrating it so something that actually did happen this week I feel like is a good that's something good to point out is in my physics class MJ more of all the classes more than I think 64% of our of the whole class failed the test and our teacher pointed out that hey majority of this is because of our cell phones and instead of her going on this huge rant saying cell phones is a big deal she actually wanted to take into perspective of how it was a big deal so what she did was she actually made us all take out our cell phones turn our ringers on and set them on the desk and then she proceed to call out students of saying hey you always have music playing you always have Tik Tok playing so I want you to do is disconnect your Bluetooth turn your volume all the way on and start playing your music and when she did this she then went over explained the test scores to us with music blaring ringers going off and it was chaotic but it also put a perspective of this is what we're listening to when we're trying we're trying to teach us this and this is why we're bombing our like physics test so instead of her again going on this rant saying hey you guys need to put your phone aways phone away and her a perspective of this is what I'm seeing with this class classroom with Tik toks just scrolling music with very vulgar language playing and just like the ringer going on like seven times a minute and so I feel like instead of just discussing with the classroom teachers need to get creative just like that to really just put in perspective of what's going on in the classroom and this and yeah about the phone policy love that love it and our last thing sorry our last thing that we did um that we really want to take into account is our teacher student check in I know there's a survey that usually goes out um for teachers specifically about uh what regularly how much they check in on their students um I think the data said that in the beginning of the year is when they really start to check in people as students come in but as the year progresses that kind of deteriorates as you know we get into more classwork and then students talk about whether they have a trusted adult most students say that they don't have a trusted adult and so the question is why don't they feel like they can trust someone and that goes into conversation um our teachers are adults they are supposed to initiate those conversations between uh students so having something engaging that students can do um to kind of build a connection with their teacher can allow that trust because we understand that trust is not built in a day it takes it's a process that happens so teachers checking in regularly with our students I feel like would create a nice lesion to have that trusting adult and so that they can even further trust them with having their phone and not feeling that hurt and ick cuz again our our Society is really heavy technical use so getting our phones taken away is like taking something of our heart that's why parents not even time out yeah like parents aren't even going to this is a commercial now brought to you by student board members taking away phones is Mom are dad are you listening in our heart no she is listening she's actually watching but yeah it's like taking part of us away so having that trusting relationship with our teachers would help ensure so we wanted to talk to our teachers first let them hear how students feel about it and then have our teachers initiate that process um starting in a few weeks if that is possible but yeah wow I love it thank you so much for the Vivid um reporting I love it with all the color I love it okay we're moving to 7.3 board committee reports um we'll start with the equity and teaching and learning I can do um so just a quick update on what we did at uh Equity teaching and learning uh we had opportunity to preview two of the presentations that we're seeing tonight uh the one we saw on I lead and then uh we gave some feedback and heard about some um course proposals and changes to course names uh for the course selection process at the Junior High and um high schools so that's a summary love it okay moving on finance and Facilities I can um okay whatever so let's see um go over two of them um basically just a proposed budget calendar just the uh uh the timing of the different pieces to the budget um we'll hear more about that probably in next couple board meetings um update on bids and our RPS that are currently uh in process uh we talked about um co-ops versus rfps standardizing paper um you know instead of just buying it randomly um and then the Boulder Hill playground um update took a turn uh that will be discussed today tonight yep coming up it's a good turn a good turn yeah don't you know just real quick you mentioned budget calendar and I just want to mention that you know for the community at large I don't think many times we realize um how transparent we actually are in this District we are religiously asking for not only fiveyear projections but we're religiously asking for um um scenarios in those fiveyear projections that's not necessarily a guarantee in all districts that that as far as them religiously doing that every year and so I'm not saying we're perfect but again going back to that issue with systems I think it's important for us to notate actually how transparent we are compared to other districts well and I think it's really important regarding that um rapael gave us a very high level calendar um can we put that on the Internet or is that on the internet it can't be on okay okay so the first step in that is we the board has to give um someone the um the basically the um I don't know why words are escaping right the authority to uh work on our budget and we will do that at our next meeting and it will be obviously our CFO so that's what kicks the whole process off and then you'll see the highlevel um dates that for the proposed budget calendar and part of that includes a public hearing where we do involve the community in the process so it's very important um to talk about that and then I just also want to touch upon we did also talk about fees in the district and where fees are at um both fees you know that come in and fees that are paid to the school district why they are paid and we did ask the administration just to make sure that we are not putting any undue um uh heaviness on families that are super involved in the district so if you're for instance you know uh many of our high school students have various activities that they're involved in under the year if they happen to also be in three Sports and they want to go to homecoming and they're a band student and they have all this stuff going on is there something we can do to reduce the burden the financial burden on them we can't take away fees it's always going to be a part of our life here but um for you know families that um are do have students that are where the financial burden is really heavy we did ask the administration just into look at some opportunities for instance if you play three Sports you know we won't require a a a fee for the third sport or something like that so they are going to look into some creative ideas that they can bring back to us and I just wanted to make sure that we captured that from our meeting thank you okay um policy and legislative can you can we start with this so our students can hear this and then we can it's in the information agenda so I don't know I think we would have to make a motion to move it oh up okay so we're gonna okay I I was just trying to figure out because it's getting late now and um we need to let you all go home but appreciate your contribution I'm sorry can can we can we actually table this to the next meeting if it's wrong no we we got to do it but it's okay they they'll hear it next time okay thank you for your participant we could it's October 22 question is how many things do we have on the next agenda it won't be as heavy I think heavy agenda it won't be as heavy as this one yeah I think we should move it we table the is IB resolutions because we don't need to have it for information and voting we just have to have a chance to discuss and do a straw poll on them okay so second oh make a motion oh wait oh okay all right so policy and legislative is there anything else that went on in your meeting oh at our meeting sorry um was there anything else oh yes yes there was so we had an opportunity to preview the ISB uh iasb resolutions that we'll talk about during information session or possibly at a later time uh and then uh we also as part of our legislative um um piece of the committee uh decided to um hire highlight uh some upcoming um legislation uh and our Communications Department is going to help us do that so we took a look at a bunch of laws uh that were enacted in the last session uh and we chose three to highlight for the community in the um in the coming weeks um is it is it upcoming or is it's already passed correct what the ones that we chose the legislation we chose yeah they've already passed y public Acts did do we want to highlight the content of those that those acts um I know that we I chose one uh about the development at the state level of an early childhood Department um I thought that would be something good for our community to know that the state is really investing uh in systems and support for Early Childhood so the one that I highlighted was uh AI generated sexual explicit digital image um and what that does is um there's already legislation in place but it enhances it um it adds the obscene depiction of a purported child as one of the prohibited offenses that prevents an individual from being issued a school bus driver's license so um it's important to know that everybody is vetted properly uh SB 3237 which is a Public Act but I don't I don't have the Public Act number in front of me sorry uh but here's the part you need to know or we need to know to receive an adjustment under this the subsection this is talking about school grants a school district on the 2004 2005 or 2006 School construction Grant List that's us Y Must initially apply and be approved during the first three application Styles Cycles after June 30th 2024 so I'm assuming and I'm hoping we're on top of that and I believe I've heard that we are so um yeah I I highlighted that one because uh we are always hopeful to yeah and there it is Public Act 103 um 0960 so we talked about that in finance of facilities as well I just I think this the committee wants to underscore that and the legislative part part we're just trying to open up communication with our community and highlight things that are going on at the state level in regards to legislation could local or local okay 7.4 board member comments any board member comments I just wanted to share that I know we did this on our board shoutouts and uh Mr Gatewood said it that yesterday was National coaches day was also National instructional coaches day Appreciation Day excuse me and it's a day to recognize and celebrate the work of our instructional coaches who support our students and our teachers in creating engaging learning environments and experiences and I just want to say that we have some pretty incredible ones in this district and I want to give a that shout out and thanks to them What's happen we done okay um all right 8.1 the consent agenda can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda please make a motion to approve all items under consent including 8.1 minutes from the Board of Education meeting on September 23rd 2024 open and close session and the Board of Education workshop on September 28th 2024 8.2 to acknowledge the foyer requests received by the district and 8.3 to approve the field trips for overnight and or over 200 miles I have a quick question on the Foya um there's only one Foya there it's not usually we have like a chart that says we receive this this this and this and this is just one response I'm just confirming we only had one foer request and this is the response it's like one big one so I hear that we did thank you g hi Dr Mar hi hi hi hi hi hi motion passes 70 okay uh buckle up uh now let's get to work it's been a a fruitful evening uh first up uh Mr oemi paper supplies RFP big day for 308 let's talk about paper so uh in the past I suggested what can you pull the mic just closer just want to make sure everybody here thank you in the past what we've done as a district is we tend to buy paper on a retail basis that's needed what does retail mean I me whatever is convenient uh Amazon Quail staple there was no coordinated way of buying paper especially for a district out size so in trying to address that and use our buying power to realize some savings wow in the purchase of paper we develop an RFP and then we asked our vendors to actually respond to the RFP we got actually a pretty good response from from vendors and based on the responses that we were receive we decide to make allocation based on the quality of the paper as well as the pricing of the paper great and those are the recommendations that we we're sharing okay thank you lots of excitement out there about that questions well we want to thank your team for taking leadership on this and uh moving us forward and really using our buying power as a district so thank you um next I want to invite U Mr Queen 9.2 we want to invite you for uh a presentation regarding our playground grant for Homestead Lakewood Creek and Boulder Hill yes so thank you for the opportunity to talk about it these are three of our most deteriorating playgrounds that we need to address um the story kind of started with Boulder Hill as uh Mr Cerone had commented on as we were going to talk about that at FFC um during my discussions with other vendors it was brought to my attentions about a playtime Grant this grant covers 50% of the cost of the playground structure itself wow this doesn't include swings or anything of that nature so for me right away I wanted to wrap this Boulder hell project into that because we were hitting some high numbers already so after we sat down and discussed all these Street playgrounds and the rehab rehabilitation of them the cost was roughly the cost of what it was going to cost for us to do Boulder Hill all together um we we're playing a little bit of a challenges because our playgrounds are all over the place and we have some that are inclusive and some that are not inclusive an inclusive playground makes that ADA accessible meaning all all students can access this playground um so there there's are some cost differences in between what you see so it's not a total 5050 Grant where we got a solid number and we're paying 50% of the cost and they're paying 50% of the cost this is just for the structure alone so the total purchase to replace three facilities four playgrounds is at uh 700 and let me put my glasses on 9365 so we would want to start this project at the beginning of summer as soon as school lets out let these little ones get in there and start enjoying this along with the community members that this would involv and most likely benefit all any questions can I reiterate that a little bit of about what we talked about or I like your com of uplift a little bit of what we talked about safety was a big concern um I also just wanted to say Striker I know you're not listening but we heard you um he wants his his his a better um playground at Boulder Hill um and also I think it's really important to talk about what recess time and this time for students and how important it is um in their day to kind of reset their brains um so this is something that is very important I know that people will say well why are you prior prioritizing these projects um it is because this is incredibly important not only to the school but to these communities that use this these facilities outside of the school day so the surrounding homes and neighborhoods that use this we really feel like this is a really important and um uh critical use of these funds and I just have to give it a huge uh thank you to the operations team for seeking out the grants to make this possible it's a really really big deal well just as you mentioned it um in my opinion and I believe the research backs it up a playground is going to increase you know uh outcomes you know it's going to um regulate behaviors so there's a lot of different things that you know uh kids with IEPs um it's just great so I don't know that I don't question this investment at all um it's definitely something that's necessary um and just and even for safety but yeah it's great for our schools and for those times when they have time to use a playground but as you mentioned just great for the communities how many times as a parent did I take my girls to the playground after school or on a Sunday or on a Saturday uh and different play grounds around the community one question I do have um is earlier in the year uh we had discussions in the abatement discussions with rajo about um some of the playground possibilities um yes can we get an update on that have it Mr we had an initial conversation with representative from rajo from Caris rasio is the Industrial company Caris is the uh real estate developer and and also a representative from J jll which is uh uh the real estate uh uh sales company that works with uh cares R and uh they requested that we provide them the design for the park that we wanted to see we provided that information to them and we need to schedule a follow-up meeting uh to meet with them to determine what the next step on their part will be to help us with the development of the pars so a lot of work went into really preparing that Mr Queen and Mr worked quite hard on kind of providing preparing a scope of work design design so we're waiting and we will not we will we will wait but we will uh pursue as well yeah to make sure they make good on those commitments that they promised us are these parks in any way um a part of IG with the park district or is just solely us actually that's a great question they are so the initial plan with the part District yes it was in with them and and there are several playgrounds that we do where they cover a third of the cost um this deal was just too good to to pass up and and so this is not affiliated with the park district but we we still work with a number of our of our playgrounds with the park district in our in our governmental agreements where they cover a third of the cost so the the rebuilding just to confirm the rebuilding is not a part of it but they will still get to use it as a part of their intergovernmental agreement absolutely you know that a lot is the same pot of money you know from the taxpayers so yeah two and I can't overstate what uh Mr Quinn would say just said when we price the individual Parks initially the lowest amount to fix one of the par coming out of our bucket is was $626,000 for one part if we multiply that by three we're talking about real money now we're in the position to do all three for the equivalent of what it will cost to do one Park pretty close and having an accessible Park um is actually is great it's great for the community not not complaining there's not there's not uh no one's disputing that oh no I know but I just I actually wanted to make sure that um we did talk about that just because it's so um there's not that many there not any in our community there's there's none in our community so so this is not only an opportunity to upgrade these Parks but there's an opportunity to have inclusive um features for students and that to have that at this time is incredibly helpful yeah that's that's major for us and and we we got some great warranties for the pole structures and and uh the mounting braces it's a lifetime warranty on it um slides and swings of that nature carry a 10year warranty with the exclusion of vandalism okay and as far as paying for it we're fortunate the board remember the bond that was sold in February of 2022 that is the working cash Bond uh We've we've spend quite a bit of it trying to get uh chillers and uh rooftop unit and uh uh roofs replaced but we have enough money to be able to pay for it and uh we have a timeline that we actually need to spend this so that's the other that's the other issue because if we don't spend it then we got an issue with the IRS uh with Arbitrage so it it works out perfectly great no hot aluminum slides for our kids no they'll never experience the burning legs thank you thank you Mr Queen to you and your team and thank you Mr Obi thank you uh next uh board member travel trip to the uh triple I conference this is an important annual learning opportunity for our board any questions comments about this and this an important uh investment in the board's ability to both really learn from colleagues from acoss across the state um but I also think uh having gone last year for the first time with this board I really felt like it was a great opportunity to really um just gain many new ideas that we brought back it's an important investment make a motion to table 9.4 second I actually have a question about triple I there is a meals at $44 per day is that that new I've never I've always paid for my own meals we've all have here so are we doing the standard practice that's been the board's P for a long okay myself I just want to make sure because this has been a point of contention for people in the past and we have stated out loud that we and it's indiv up to individual board members but um that we do I I just want to say I'm going to pay for my own food too and we've all done that it's in we actually had this conversation in policy it's reflective of whatever the I don't know the number off top of my had but we had this conversation policy not about this in particular but about reimburse so we just we have to put it in there it's standard and right and I just want to make the note yeah I I don't know I don't ever turn receipts in so I have no idea I I don't know okay yeah I carpol for that I know didn't I did I drive you last year I one year I took the train and walked so I don't know that's I did last year I took the train and walked yeah we try to we we try very hard not to put any undue cost in here that comes out of taxpayer money that's all I wanted to say so it's all worth it too so but to the point in investment I think it is an important event for our board members to attend sorry okay anything else because we had a motion to table 9.4 in a second right yeah okay I Miss ven hi Mr hi hi hi Mr hi Mr gate I motion passes 70 an important part of our annual review process is reviewing our High School courses and I want to invite Dr Paul on behalf of the learning Innovation to talk a little bit about some of the changes that were brought to the equity teaching and learning committee as well as to speak to the process involved here so thank you Dr Paul thank you so this was a collaborative thank you so much this was a collaborative effort with the learning Innovation Department as well as our teachers Department chairs in building Administration that included assistant principles of curriculum instruction assistant principles of special education student services as well as our building principles um we really worked hard this year as a collective team to identify what we're currently offering and doing a review of our course guide um and today you're going to see some recommend did changes again with a collaborative effort for course title changes and descriptions um in relationship to the CTE Department um in addition we have some uh curriculum course proposals we'd like to bring forward to you for information this evening um as you might recall uh students select courses early in the year and preparation for the following school year uh so we are kind of working backwards with that timeline in place um giving you a chance to hear more about the course uh update proposals today as well as uh creating some space for you to dialogue if you there's any questions I can answer for you so first I'd like to share with you some curriculum course title change recommendations um you can see listed here that in the third column these are our current course titles in the course catalog um they range from describing directed study courses with a specific title the recommendation from our staff and our leaders is to change the course title name to directed student directed studies CTE this creates more clarity for students when they're selecting courses um reduces confusion um students can add actually enroll in these courses they have to seek approval from their counselor um and conversations will take place with the student and the teacher and the counselor prior to making an enrollment um decision in addition in the next slide you can see again the current course titles um in the third column and we're recommending for uh business internship and CT internship to change to the title of internship uh this gives a broader um opportunity for students to take internships as it relates to work-based learning language as we work towards creating opportunities for students to continue to take courses that would allow them to explore potential careers in their future in addition we are um beginning our conversation about sunsetting courses uh although we're only recommending one course to Sunset or as some uh State um removing the course from the course catalog um we have recognized during during an analysis of student enrollment numbers that this course has had um no enrollment for the last couple years and so we're recommending this course be removed from the course catalog um more information will come in the future about any potential sunsetting of courses as our team along with the Department chairs and building leadership do an analysis this year and looking at historical data for student enrollment numbers as as well as student interest and really wanting to streamline that learning progression for students um and so more to come uh in the coming U months great uh there's uh a few more slides related to course title changes you can see again on the third slide our current course catalog um related to different uh courses that when we did this analysis we found that was quite confusing for students and families um so in order to have a quick um review of what the progression of learning is we're recommending a numeric change here you see in front of you to um our students to be able to see exactly what the next course sequence would be um and to create Clarity and to reduce confusion the same thing you see here um with some of the changes again the numeric sequencing you'll see in the cabinet making as well as the computer AED drafting again using the collaborative conversation with our teachers Department chairs and building leaders we were able to make these recommended changes so the course catalog um in addition um you'll see that there's a current course description for a course called technology applications um in doing a review of this course and recognizing there have been some changes in regards to technology and wanting to reflect that in the course description you see that listed here uh there's certain words that are bolded to kind of indicate um the change that we're requesting be made in the course catalog and the same thing for advanced business business technology um again wanting to make some changes and advancement in technology in the course um and providing greater Clarity any questions on the course title changes that we're recommending and or uh the course descriptions uh I just want to say like we saw these at the committee and we were the these title Chang I think are make a lot of sense so um I appreciate the clarity the clarity it brings especially like on the parent side when you're trying to help students choose courses uh that's helpful you mentioned suns setting at the beginning earlier so I just want to highlight that we're going to I think you're moving towards new courses that are going to be coming on board and so I think I'm happy to hear that you're starting to think more about what a sunsetting process looks like because they're never easy decisions the one that you highlighted was like the easiest one you're probably ever going to make because if you don't have enrollment for three years it's an easy one to cross off the books but when you have programs that may have been in our district for a long time and maybe have had three kids enrolled five kids enrolled those are those are harder and can be emotional so I think um and as you add more courses as we discussed at the committee as you add more courses um you have to think about sunsetting courses because there's only so so many students and if they're taking one course they're not taking another course and so there's going to be some natural kind of is the word attrition like movement towards other places so I just wanted to highlight that discussion yeah thank you Amy any other comments question just I think it would be helpful to underscore uh just briefly the process you got to get here because I I I think if you're not aware this was not a unilateral decision this involved a pretty weighty process and so I think if you could just just do a quick synopsis of it yes so um we meet as a learning Innovation Department with high school department shairs on a monthly basis and meeting with the high school principls and talking about our Focus for the year what does that look like in like we talked a lot about exactly what Amy is highlighting wanting to have a continual learning for our students and wanting to make really informed decisions using the data we have in front of us like student enrollment information as well as creating an opportunity to survey our students as well and getting their perspective of the things that they would like to take that maybe we're not offering that we are offering and then also we're working very hard at um helping our system learn more about career Pathways which you're going to hear a little bit more about today in two of our mended courses and wanting to make connections to courses that we do offer to potential careers for our students um and that's going to take some work and effort um with our department chairs and collaborating together and just like Amy is illustrating Um this can be a very emotional conversation one that we want to honor all of the emotions people have and um but also recognize that we might have to make some collaborative decisions um to move forward to really create some really rich learning experiences for our students thank you thank you Dr curriculum courses she done no no we have one more oh okay yeah I'll wait take one sentence and that's it do you want to ask it now I can wait no it's not a question oh great never mind great job on the collab cooking uh class and uh whatever we can do to reach out to uh parents to expand whatever we can do with collab awesome and thank you thank you for creating this pathway of what I'm about to explain Jared I love that good I just want we'll we'll start there we'll go from the bottom up here in the presentation so um collab cooking is one of the courses we're recommending for the 2526 uh school year um this is something that did originally uh come from our community and our process is to go through our schools um our teachers and our department shares and our assistant principls of student services special education curriculum instruction building principles um they together wrote A Course proposal for this opportunity for our students to um take a course that um is differentiated and life skills um for our students in their future um this would also build on a practice we currently have um called collaborative uh PE leaders um we would offer this course for our students to be collaborative um uh uh collaborative leaders um sorry it's so late I'm like the words are escaping me um and an opportunity for students to be paired with a general education student together um and taking this course to create leadership opportunities for our students but also of course it's designed to meet the needs of our um student population um in addition uh we are proposing two additional courses introduction to education and clinical experience in education as I mentioned earlier we are in the process of exploring a career Pathways for our students uh one course is currently off offered uh currently in our schools uh called um introduction to teaching uh this would be the title change would be introduction to education and we be offered as a dual credit with wans Community College as well as an additional course you see listed here um clinical experience in education so um we did include in um some additional information to share with you more information about career Pathways for you um this is something our system is learning more about and we're embarking together our new uh director of career and College Planning um or career and college readiness uh Ben Owen is leading the charge in this work and has been working very hard with our DC's our teachers and all of the building leaders and then the last course that uh we'd like to share with you and we're proposing for the next school year is AP African-American studies um this interdisciplinary course would be housed within the social studies Department um again some additional information has been shared with you about projected costs for each one of the courses not only for FTE potential um uh textbooks uh professional development um and Jared to answer your question about field trips at our committee meeting we also have that in there too for you to review so you have an idea about what the projected cost could be um for these courses any questions yeah I have a couple questions um the on AP African-American studies did we find out if we're going to have prerequisites for that or what is the recommended like when would students take this course yes I did ask that question I did not get an answer but I will have that before um our next board meeting to give you okay will you bring that to the board meeting or will you send that to us how will I how can we um how would you prefer well yeah so I think to as soon as we get it you can send it we'll send it as part of the update to to the board and then also at the board meeting we'll have it so I ask because a course catalog can sometimes create barriers for students who might want to take a course and so the more access we can give to especially to a course to a course that's going to open doors for students I think it's really important that we think about we're not putting like three or four prerequisites in front of them before they have access to that course so great Point that's really important thank you for sharing I'd be interested if they' if the department chairs have looked at some of the other surrounding districts who might be offering this course what their prerequisites look like or if they even have a prerequisite or a recommended um year they would take AP African-American history yes thank you I'm sure you could um so that thank you for looking into that and then the other question I have um is um or just a wondering with the intro to Ed and the clinical experience in education has there been discussions or do you think there will be future discussions about how that could create a pipeline into our Residency program yes so actually when we were discussing this with our department shairs in building leaders we use our residency program as an example that we have already taken steps to support the teacher shortage with our adults and here's an opportunity to help grow our own with our students and thinking about education courses where uh when you have a dual credit course you're guarantee the credit um for college to take with you and really create that opportunity to kind of build on the work we're doing and and an adult space um and now mimic that here in the student space and W bansi has an articulated agreement with Aurora University so students could take their courses at high school do whatever they need to do at bansi and then FasTrack to Au in coordination with us obviously because I know that Mr wmy wants them in the pipeline yes go ahead teachers correct no we we absolutely recognize um with the amount of career Pathways that Dr Paul and and her team and Department chairs are are um reviewing and looking into that this this education pathway is is a key provider for us uh in the future we know in in our community we have many many many staff members who work here live here and raise their children here but to aggressively start to provide opportunities for our students thinking about this not just as a a sophomore or a junior or a senior but even earlier to start thinking about that four year five year six year career path that I know learning and Innovation is going to be uh reviewing uh we're very very excited about this um for future opportunities and look to have a profound interdependence amongst human resources and learning and Innovation I just want to share a quick story and I'll be very quick because I know what time it is but like when we when I was when we were campaigning and I was knocking on doors I knocked on a door of a parent um in the prairie Point area and she relayed to me she said my daughter always wanted to be a teacher she went to school to be a teacher graduated from ohos uh and then um she you know she wanted to come back and teach at asgo and it just didn't happen for her and I was like oh well we got to fix that right so I think this would be the way to fix that yep if you're still in contact with that person oh no I don't remember I didn't take notes Unapologetic about recruiting please send that information to me Dr Mario I would appreciate that thank you if you're listening out there if you out there I have a question about on the last page where it says this may be an Endeavor for 262 given the planning what does that reference the field trip or the entire course the field trip oh are you talking about the additional um projected cost um are you talking about APB African-American cities yeah I have to go back and look and see exactly the language on that to be able to get back to you on an answer because I'm just very interested in like you know what are we is this a course we have we have to prove it I get that but Our intention is to have this in the course catalog correct for the year coming up correct okay thank you I just want to make that clarification okay thank you thank you Dr Paul and to um also your team and all the other uh leaders and Educators and staff who were involved in this process and we thank you for this presentation this evening and that concludes um our uh presentation Madam president 9.6 okay I so Mr Bell for not first read policies do we want to delay this I know you were i' like to recommend we delay this one for the next I would appreciate that okay 9.6 Madam president make make a motion to we're tbling right for the next me make a motion to table 9.6 for the next uh October 22nd meeting second that meeting hi Mario hi hi 21st hi I I I motion passes 70 action item 10.1 bills for payment can I have a motion please make a motion to authorize the payment of bills in the amount of two or I'm sorry 4,1 $658 as presented second Mr i i i Mar I I motion passes 70 action item 10.2 approval of resolution providing for the issue of General obligation bonds can I have a motion please make a motion to approve the resolution providing for the issue of not to exceed $1,150,000 General obligation refunding School bonds of the district for the purpose of refunding certain outstanding bonds of the district providing for the levy of a direct annual tax sufficient to pay the principal and interest on said bonds authorizing the proposed sale of said bonds to the purchaser thereof and authorizing the execution of certain ESR gr agreements in connection therewi as presented second I I I I I Mr I I motion passes 70 action item 10.3 approval of Master facility plan can I have a motion please make a motion to award the project of the master facility plan to whiten company for a total amount of $380,000 for all three phases second Miss V hi Dr Mario I miss i i i i i motion passes 70 action item 10.4 approval of custodial supplies are FP can I have a motion please make a motion to approve the selection of the top seven vendors to provide custodial supplies between them janco performance chemical Pike pyramid School products unipac unique and Warehouse direct second Mr Sone hi hi Mr hi hi hi hi Dr Mario I I motion passes 70 10.5 approval of personnel report can I have a motion please I make a motion to approve the Personnel report as discussed and presented second we not going to let URS retire as discussed second I already did no I'm not well I know I vote any question I seconded it you are otherwise distracted is there a discussion is there a discussion discussion comments is there a discussion comments comments comments are that I think people don't realize that we very quickly approve a Personnel report there's a lot of work that goes into it we realize these are people's lives we do not go into this at all um not understanding that and we often have to say yes to things Ursula is such an amazing part of the school board and how the school board functions how the superintendent functions she has been a steward of absolute Grace and dignity and um a vault and all of those things and she is going to be a huge loss to this District so we don't do this lightly but we also know that she deserves to have one on hack of a retirement so with that with a heavy heart second very heavy second I hi hi I motion passes 70 um can I have a motion to adjourn make a motion to adjourn second

zoning board of appeals at 7:15 p.m. and historical commission meeting at 7:30 p.m. October 10th planning board meeting at 7:15 p.m. for full agendas check the town website and select view all calendars now some exciting upcoming events in Ashland Fall Fest the date for Fall Fest is Saturday October 19th from 3 p p.m. to 6: PM a community event featuring games food drinks and live music by hit the bus band vendors include Joey D's Wings and Things and refreshing concessions enjoy seasonal treats and fun activities for all ages Halloween bash rou tees the date is Friday October 25th from 6:m to 800 p.m. a safe space for kids aged 12 to 18 with activities like a Haunted Trail henna tarot face paint and crafts and a costume swap enjoy spooky snacks and entertainment build wave will run from October to December a creative building program for students utilizing various materials like Lego and Plus+ sess sessions are held on Wednesdays at Warren school and Thursdays at MES registration is available online halfday explorers will be October 28th 29th and 30th a program for K through five students on early release days childrens will be picked up from school for an afternoon adventure and return to the community center by 5:00 p.m.

the greater Ashlin Lions annual porchetta the date will be Friday October 18th at 6 pm at the Ashland VFW fundraising event to support the Lions Community efforts finding William Lewis will be held on October 20th 2024 at 2 p.m. it will be held at the ashin Historical Society at two Myrtle Street this will be a free presentation in exploring the life of William Lewis through his extensive writings presented by Bruce Craven and Christy higginbottom parent and caregiver book read and discussion will be Wednesday October 23rd from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at the ashin public library discussion of the anxious Generation by Jonathan ha registration is required for a seat and complimentary book copy The Haunt dates will be October 18th to 20th and October 25th to 27th this will be a spooky attraction returning for two weekends tickets available online with proceeds benefiting local arts and YMCA initiatives the wicked pickle ball tournament will be October 26th this will be located at hopkington YMCA outdoor Center this will be a Halloween themed pickleball tournament open to all skill levels costumes are optional with a competition for the best costume registration and details available on online The Rocky Horror Show show join the Ashland Community Theater for The Rocky Horror Show featuring live music in Ashland on October 24th to 26th at 8:00 p.m.

and October 27th at 4 p.m. tickets are available online and if you cannot attend consider donating to support the theater lastly the Salem and Sanctuary cave walk on October 26 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. the location will be in the Ashen toown Forest Winter Street parking lot ashin Mass join us for a captivating walk through through the Ashland toown Forest where we will explore the rich history of the land this event will cover significant stories including nitm settlements refugees from the Salem witch trials and the ongoing efforts to preserve the forest against invasive species for more information on any of these events you can check respective websites or contact organizers directly that is all for today thank you for our town manager Michael Herbert for writing this newsletter and keeping us all informed and thank you all for tuning in today my name is hi silver with WCA and this has been your Weekly Newsletter summary good night and go clockers

e e e for the your patience and uh good evening it's 6:09 p.m my name is Gabriel harp and chair of the nror energy commission and I'm calling this meeting to order I'm participating from my home in an arbor um let's see welcome to the October 8th electronic meeting of the uh energy commission we will conduct this meeting like inperson meetings and Commissioners during the roll call please indicate your current location also during the meeting please remain on camera just as you would be visible during inperson meetings unless your camera does not connect at the moment um finally please mute your microphone when not speaking public comment will be via telephone only to speak during any of the public comment opportunities please call one of the following to three numbers 877 85352 47 or 888 78899 and enter the meeting ID number 5 excuse me 95687 718 7876 on your phone this information is also available on the published agenda in the Public Public Notices section of the city's website or on the broadcast of this meeting on CTN Channel 16 AT&T channel 99 and online at 8 www.a2gov.org watch CN Joe would you please read the all land acknowledgement statement um if you have available yeah unfortunately I do not have access to a my computer at the moment which has the land acknowledgement on there and I do not know it off the top of my head my apologies it's all right that said I think we'll move on to the approval of the agenda um is there a motion to approve the agenda as posted in a second commissioner overp and Comm council member breggs a second okay um Commissioners please raise your hand if you want to propose or any changes or discuss an issue seeing No Hands raised those in favor of approving the agenda as posted please raise your hand and say I hi hi I all those opposed please raise your hand and say n okay seeing none opposed uh the agenda is approved and we'll move on to the approval of the minutes is there a motion to approve the minutes posted in a second commissioner colen Garcia and a second council member Briggs thank you uh Commissioners please raise your hand if you'd like to discuss any changes to the minutes seeing none raised um all those in favor of approving the minutes as posted please raise your hand and say I hi I all those opposed please raise your hand and say n seeing No Hands seeing no none opposed uh the uh minutes are approved we'll now move on to public input uh this is an opportunity for people to speak for up to three minutes you're if you're watching on CTN please call 888 78899 or 877 8535 52 47 and enter meeting ID 956 8718 7876 this information is also displayed on the meeting agenda and video feed City staff will select callers who have raised their hand one by one using the last three digits of their phone phone number um to electronically raise your hand and to indicate your desire to speak please press star N9 on your phone you will hear an automated announcement that the host is allowing you to speak when speaking please move to a quiet area and mute mute any television or background sound so that we may hear you clearly and please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments think I I can do this let me one hand raised all yep um yeah caller ending in 134 uh thank you Mr Lang and chair harp K Garber 28 H Hill Court um there are 32,000 rental units in Ann Arbor so getting green rental housing right is critical before you vote tonight ask yourself this question will the program meaningly Advance this a20 goal for the year 2030 25% of rental properties have fully electrified and the electricity powering those homes is coming from renewable energy sources I think the answer is clearly no last month I put together one checklist scenario which commissioner mky was nice enough to include in in his written comments by cobbling together a series of simple and relatively cheap steps I easily exceeded the required 80 points the way the checklist is scored there's no real incentive for landlords to Electrify appliances or to add renewable energy um the checkli the checklist should somewhat improve Energy Efficiency but I want to advance those goals last month I suggested scoring the giveaway items lower or just raising the threshold for compliance to something like 110 points uh neither was done how did we end up with such a weak ordinance I don't know I do know the task force included the Wasa area Apartment Association the association frankly is a reactionary organization dedicated almost entirely to defending the narrow economic interests of its membership on its website there's nothing about climate but lots about the progressive legislation that it opposes sure solicit its stakeholder input but leave it at that I hope we're not letting the association dictate the limits of this ordinance as Wayne Apple Yard commented last month in a climate emergency we need fast and decisive action for that all of us must sacrifice including landlords there's a risk that will pass on cost to tenants but landlords often raise this issue just to oppose effective regulation um Mr Lang uh in an email today which was copied to me thanks uh states that the ordinance is the limit of what's legally possible he writes quote this is what we are able to do and it is not something we are able to change end quote I think he needs to explain this because I don't know of any state law except for the rent control preemption that restricts the city's ability to strengthen its own rental housing code we live in a home rule state that means courts give wide discretion to local governments and the State Building Code preemption only applies to new construction so let's hear about these legal limits tonight if they're real they need to come out otherwise I think we should go back and rework the ordinance um So based on what I know now and I'll be paying close ATT attention during the meeting I would vote no on tonight's resolution um but whatever you decide please keep the climate first in mind uh as hurricane Milton is about to slam into the Florida coast thank you all for your volunteer work thank you um no further callers thank you okay um tonight on the agenda we have the resolution in support of an ordinance to amend chapter 105 of title 8 of the code of the city of an arbor to support Greening of the rental market um and in the documents uh attached to tonight's meeting in gentle also there's a the green rental housing ordinance along with the number of attachments uh related to that ordinance as well as the supplemental materials associated with that um what we'd like to do is I'd like to um ask if there's a motion to open up discussion on the ordinance so moved this is John MC thank you I'll second thank you commissioner overpack and Joe is it right that we have to have a vote to open discussion as well or no NOP okay thank you um okay um I'd like to open it up for discussion then uh of of the resolution in support of the ordinance um I know a number of uh questions and clarifications have have been raised around uh around this both through email and as follow-ups to the last Commission meeting and um Joe maybe I'll kick it off with you if you don't mind and um if there's anything that you'd like to touch on before we uh before we uh proceed to other questions or clarifications from the commission members yeah and apologies again I thought I was good on Zoom I'm not but I at least have my computer and so I'm on mobile I very much oliz um yeah so I think in general there were a couple changes that you can see that were noted in there these were largely along the lines of things that are related to um just some technical things as well as just some you know Corrections of things that were just incorrect or could be phrased in a in a better manner um and largely what was presented last week or last month is what where we're at what we're moving forward with at this time and what we're able to support um I'm happy to go into some of those um some of those questions that were posed as well as some I know I forwarded on some that were uh presented but wanted to just make sure um to see if there was any you know other questions anything like that um otherwise I'm happy to just kind of start going into those questions but yeah I just wanted to see if there was anything else that would be helpful either clarification wise or questions from folks or um any anything else for just diving into those different questions and things like that okay why don't um Joe if it makes sense for you if you don't if you don't mind if there were um top level issues that you feel like you wanted to um address immediately from those from those questions um that might help us kick off the discussion as well and then I think we can follow up with any clarifications from other commissioners sure um I do see John I think John has a hand up do you want me to go to that or do you want me to I'm happy to start wherever makes little sense for you commissioner mki yes uh thanks for recognizing me uh as was mentioned earlier uh I took another attempt at summarizing uh the kinds of concerns and issues that I and others um have with the ordinance as proposed um that was sent an email um early this afternoon to Joe and several others and it was shared with all of you um they tend to be ordered I think in order of importance and uh what I would propose if um Joe doesn't have any opening comments or no one else has any um specific other questions is that we potentially open that uh email and just simply go down that list um that way we make sure that we sort of cover all the points in order and um I'm not um requiring or demanding that every single point be addressed but I think all of these points um are relatively significant um either in general terms such as those raised by Ken Garber uh in his public comments or in terms of some specific issues um that I think are going to be important to landlords or other people that are going to be using um and having to adhere to this ordinance so that's what I would propose I am fine doing that to be clear um and I'm happy to do that I do recognize too that that could be just a lot of me sitting here reading things off so at any point people are more than welcome to jump in um but so acknowledging all that I'm happy to just I'm happy to do that if John wrote them why why not and would you be willing to do it John um I couldn't read them I mean I didn't know I haven't been checking my email this afternoon I've been traveling so sure I mean I can I can um if we if we um share the document the email then everybody can see it and I can summarize the points um I don't have to read every word is that okay Joe yes that is fine um again no no no you're good um yeah and again just noting I I don't know what's happening I cannot access zoom on my computer uh so I can't screen share at the moment yeah and and maybe maybe what we do is we can start there's there's sort of three top level top level issues I think bro broadly construed um that may are probably the the big the biggest ones maybe to start out with and and if I might just briefly characterize each of them the first question has to do with um OSI the office of sustainability innovation's confidence that this ordinance and the and the the goals outlined in the a20 plan uh will be achieved um with this so do I have that that with do I have that basically correct John yes the a20 plan um as approved by city council um has certain high level goals and uh some of those then are broken down obviously to specific goals related to rental properties and so the question is um does OSI believe that these goals are achievable um within the next um five five years and three months um using um or based on the ordinance as is it's it's personally my belief that um it will not um be uh an enabler to meet these targets but I'd like to hear that from OSI and um then a lot of other points are frankly you know dependent on that as to whether or not those goals can be met or not in the assessment of OSI so the first first question was about those sort of the a20 plan and the and the broad goals of the a20 plan and and this ordin with respect to this ordinance and then there was a second question with respect to the the thresholds and and the sort of point system and how they were arrived at um and then the third had to do with a variety of specific checklist items and the sort of you know framing um of particular approaches or uh options within the tech check within that checklist um uh for different types of of um uh changes that that uh building owners might make uh or activities that they might undertake with respect to the checklist itself so those are sort of three big buckets of questions um at the outset um and maybe we can just start sort of with the gestal of of um gestal but also uh more specifically how you know the confidence that the OSI has around um this ordinance and the program overall with respect to the a20 goals you bet um and one other thing too just noting I think we might have amidst all the technical stuff we might have missed um doing the actual attendance roll call and all that but um if we need to do that formally we can but otherwise I can see all who's here and I believe we have Quorum so I think we're okay there um okay so yeah the the first one just talking about do we feel comfortable with these goals and the answer is yes to that I think still with you know the way this ordinance is laid out there you know there might still be work that needs to be done on top of it but that's something that's completely doable and I think this is something that sets us up to do all of that kind of work I think it's also important to note that you know we we look at this plan and I think a thing that we've you know said about it every you know every time the day it was signed the plan was out of date and the plan was wrong there's always things that are changing there's always things that are new and there's things that are in our new and you our new landscape that weren't things that we would have even thought could have existed at the time of this plan I mean just to name a few um if we're looking at some of the recent you know state level legislation requiring our um you know our electricity to be uh 50% from carbon free sources by 2030 that's something that's going to have a big impact and that's going to do a lot to kind of meet um some of these goals um you know specifically that you know rental properties uh having their electricity coming from renewable energy sources um um similarly the IRA tax credits that was something that you know at the time of the plan was not even something that felt like something that could exist and that's already having huge impacts on our economy on our building stock obviously it's not you know at the level of where those goals are at but it is something that very much gets us to those um you know really helps in a way that again we could not have fathomed at the time that the plan was created so all of that was a lot of talking but again yes I I personally feel confident and still being able to meet these goals there's going to be you know a lot of work and as with everything there is not one solution to it you know there's not one program not one ordinance that's going to make all of the change and that's why we need to be working at all these different levels getting people into this getting people moving forward and working at it from there so yes I think it is still completely feasible um any follow-ups to that otherwise I can go on to the next about the points and where the points are at commissioner Mercy I personally feel that is overly optimistic uh one of the goals is that uh let me double check here um I think 25% of all R rental units will be electrified by 2030 uh if you remember the original version of this list it was an attachment sent to you before the last meeting uh Ken Garber put together a scenario where um 86 points can be achieved simply by coming up with a plan and by doing rental uh uh yeah renter education and a few other things but really basically no significant decarbonization uh activities I I just simply don't believe that um you can take uh osi's word for it um I I think we should um remember this when we go forward but I don't believe that the threshold of 80 points for the checklist pathway is going to get us anywhere close to uh achieving the goals that are outlined at the the beginning of my email yeah I guess it must unless there's more that kind of Segways into the discussion around the point total so I'm to jump into that again just making sure there's nothing else before I jump into that council members clarifications on that or comments I'll I'll add one um I think um I'm I'm not sure who was I believe it was another commission member uh commissioner mki it might it might have been you um there was a a recent article in the journal science that looked at climate policy and the impact of of climate policies and a number and did a sort of comparative approach and I think I think if I um had the and I can I'll share this with all the commission members after after the meeting but I think one of the big takeaways from that was that those um those entities that had implemented policies were large the ones that were largely successful were accomplishing that through a combined uh sort of um approach to both incentives disincentives a variety of different policies all sort of mutual mutually complimenting each other um in in a variety of different ways and so I think um without getting into the details of of their analysis I think one of the takeaways for that is that um for me was that this approach fits into a broader strategy um of which this is perhaps one um one part of that strategy in which there are a large number or a moderate number of programs that are also complement that both from the perspective of incentives and and potentially disincentives as well um and so uh I'm I'm I'm somewhat encouraged by that by hearing that from from uh uh um from Joe around the description of the impact of of this relative to A2 Z's goals um but I'll share that article with you all just sort of as a broader policy document uh and Analysis uh commissioner mki thank you I'm going to comment most on this point I'm not going to provide the same level of comments as we get further down the list um so you can rest assur of that uh this is really the key point this in the next next Point as far as where the thresholds are set um the other stuff is is important and I really encourage OSI to look carefully at these points um I agree completely with what Gabe said um I've read a synopsis of the article that he's talking about um there's no doubt that uh this Ordinance Works in concert with other actions that OSI is has taken the city has taken we as uh uh as voters have taken with the millage and the funds that are available through the millage the problem is is that the threshold of 86 on the checklist passway does not require anybody to do most of these really significant electrification measures or Energy Efficiency measures so you can get 80 80 over 80 points by doing things like just go back and look again um is that uh a dishwasher is available in the unit ducks are sealed and insulated um electric rain uh the often the element in range are electric windows can be opened you know things like that that's not going to make a significant difference in whether or not uh we meet our a20 uh targets at least in my view so I I I I don't dispute at all in fact I entirely agree that we need to do this as a package of activities I just really highly doubt that this is going to make the kind of uh significant uh impact that we need to see from this ordinance commissioner overp yeah I was just listening to a podcast um last night uh you know looking at the can the difference between the Canadian approach to decarbonization in the US approach and not doing it holistically but the thing they focused on was in Canada they had a carbon tax uh that was very Progressive and you know essentially what a lot of our friends and colleagues have been uh pushing for in the United States where you'd You' tax carbon emissions of consumers you would then um use that money and redistribute it back to in L back to the consumer and in the in the place other taxes and Barry Rabe one of our colleagues in at un u ofm who's total expert on this stuff I haven't had a chance to talk to him but you know he was extoling the virtues of the Canadian approach uh back when he wrote his book on different ways to to uh do carbon taxes and you know we all know that or have heard anyhow that economists see that as the you know the ideal way um but this podcast was pointing out that that tax is uh probably you know charitable to say it's dead in the water it's going to go away and the whole you know Federal uh scene in in Canada is going to go the other direction and part because of this tax um and then they compare that to what um Biden administration's done which is rather than requiring things uh just put uh a lot of carrots on the um you know on the table and incentivize people to do the right thing and um it just you know I'm not an expert in public policy but it's interesting uh just to note that it is this you know I haven't read the paper that you mentioned Gabriel but I think it it it's sounds very familiar in the sense that you got to have this constellation and in a way you got to take a leap of faith um um this is not to say you know because we are decarbonizing in the United States a lot faster than we were a couple years ago um and it's picking up speed you know and there's no doubt it's going to continue kicking up speed even if I think even if Trump is real is elected that's another point that we won't talk about but the the the thing here is is it enough and if we start requiring if we start really pushing um renters landlords to do things and others will we get a blowback that will set us back further than have we not done that and I hate to say this but I just this one podcast made me start really thinking darn you know these guys might be right you know and I want to ask um I wanted to ask Barry what he thinks because he's so smart and so Mo you know calm about all these things but um it it this does worry me and I totally Embrace what John um and Ken were pushing for here but on the other hand I'm just a little worried that you know maybe what we need is some kind of compromise we need something that's a little tougher um in the ordinance but you know we got to be careful not to push too hard or else we'll get this blowback it's sort of like monopolization you know if we try and do that we'll just end up like Boulder and we'll will be setting you will set everything back maybe I just don't know and I you know so sorry about that it's not very definitive I know but is that kind of what you're saying Gabriel uh I believe I think that's a part of it and I think part you know part of the takeaway is also that there's AI you know a lot of these things happen at different times and at different intensities um and for different folks and so you know I think when we think about impact you there's there's ways of thinking about all or nothing there's ways of thinking about getting folks on the path let's say um I I used to work for an organization it's called Uh uh called Eco America um that was based in San Francisco and Washington DC and and and a number of the programs that they ran were based on getting large organizations sort of on the path to positive as they called it uh you know that was one of the slogans for one of the the campaigns and I think that a big part of this activity and as we we SE even seen with the with the um home energy um home energy uh inspect um uh home energy uh audit audit thank you that's the word I'm looking for inspector was not the right word rare I can guess the word um you know I think I think part of you know part of the ethos around that program feel feels a lot like it's about getting people on the path for that so for example you know the the um uh the auditor will come by and and evaluate sort of where you're at where your home's at provide you with a a sticker let's say if you've got a a gas furnace and say that says next time this will be a heat pump and it goes on the gas furnace and it's about signaling and about um reminding folks that when the time comes there's there's there's different options that can be made you don't have to go into the default the default sort of setting all the time um and I think that that for a lot of folks building owners uh renters homeowners um included a lot of the value of these programs is Simply Having the program in part to help support some of the things that they may already be trying to do in different amounts and sometime a lot of times they're not perfect and a lot of times it's not all at once um but sometimes the incremental pieces can can sort of add up in in significant ways and I think we've seen that um I think both for large organizations that are trying to do changes and also for you know programs that that Encompass um sort of city-wide scale things so I think that's where it comes from in my my my experience Joe did you want to address the oh commissioner over just listening to you it sounds to me as though maybe we should at least agree on this if it's possible that the 80% goal in other words 80% of tenant occupied homes 80% of businesses achieve 20% reduction in electricity use and 15% reduction in natural gas usage I don't know why we didn't just focus on emissions but that one is probably more doable than the 25% of rental prop properties have fully electrified and the electricity powering those homes is coming from renewable energy sources so it's really 25 the the real thing here I think that's got John and Ken I'm guessing uh really concerned because it concerns me is that 25% of rental properties are fully electrified is that fair to say John I'm concerned frankly that both are going to be achieved just because I think the threshold is too low yeah the 80 points yeah you know I'm not going to argue with you what what let me let me say one other thing while I have the floor um I would feel better if the ordinance had something that says up until 2030 uh city council and City administrator will monitor the uh progress made through the green oral housing program um there's a point later on that I'm act uh have in my email about tracking results and um potentially using a database to do that um that shouldn't be a problem because there's all these audits that are being done and points have to be awarded and every two years um do something like that up till 2030 I mean it doesn't have to be exactly as I'm prescribing now but something like this and then if it's not having the desired effect then at that time re-evaluate the threshold that um allows the certificant of occupancy to be um reissued and potentially increased it from 80 to 90 or 80 to 100 or whatever is considered to be necessary but right now we're we're we're as Ken Garber put the example together there's it's landlords if they want to really have to do very little put up Clos lines things like that it's it's really have bike racks these are not going to make significant changes in emissions in my view they will help but they're they're not going to make a big difference yeah I'm I'm All I like that idea in other words give them a chance to do something and if they don't within you know remember 2030 is not that far away two twoyear cycle and we're there um almost so they then there will be a a ratchet but another thing we could do with that same data would be make it public and I think it' be very interesting to start seeing what consumer pressure might do as well you know because at the UVM for example you know there's there's definitely going to be a lot more focus on this um and students a lot more students I think will be motivated uh to not want to live in a place where the landlord's doing squat Joe uh if I might pass it back to you with respect to the thresholds and it and it sounds like maybe there's also two additional sort of questions or clarifications that have been posed with respect to city council and City administrator monitoring the ordinance um and with respect to sort of publishing of of of metrics associated with that um is that would that are those something you might be able to address yeah yeah absolutely and again I I appreciate everyone's thoughts opinions feelings all those I mean you know there is a lot that goes into this and with that too again there is a lot that again one we are able to control and two that we aren't able to control and I think that's something that again we do need to Monitor and we do need to discuss because it is you know I I don't want to sound like a broken record and keep saying the same thing over and over again to an unsatisfying response but again at the end of the day as a municipality we cannot go above and beyond the state's building code we've talked about that in many meetings here um on all sorts of different topics that's kind of a thing that we have run into in many different Avenues and you know inherently within a policy like this that is something that is looking at building that is something we have to be very careful about we simply cannot put out something that is going to be beyond our legal authority to do and that's kind of the line that we have been walking with this and this is a thing that we've really been focusing on and so we need to find that balance of what is the pro amount that we can do that's going to make change but at the same time is again within our ability to do and that's kind of where this is where we have landed with that um this is these are the two numbers um that we have and this is where we are with that um you know I think we can sit here and it's not just this program to be clear there's other ones out there too and you know we can sit here and spend as much time as we can trying to get to something that you know gets us to that perfect you know perfect number that's going to make the biggest change G to have the biggest impact all these things um but we again have to live within the reality that is before us and we have to work within in that legal landscape and all of the other things that go with that to at least have this framework out there uh something that is out there something that is having an impact something that is getting people involved in the process again kind of like we talked about last month you know getting people involved and thinking about this is important if there is nothing then they can continue operating business as usual even if we're in a spot where say we feel that you know the policy might not be the strongest it could possibly be um but it's at least something it's getting them thinking it's getting them motivated it's getting some work done regardless um that's a pretty powerful thing especially when we're combining it with some of the different again incentives out there stacking with different programs different policies out there um and so again that's that's where we got to these numbers and that's that's kind of why we settled where we settled um you know of course we're going to be monitoring this you know it's not just going to be a thing we put out never look at again um going to be constantly looking at it again there are real constraints what we are able to do and how far we can go um but you know to the extent we're able we're going to be looking at it going to be evaluating figuring out what you know what makes the most sense can we tweak something to make it work better um we've seen that in some of our you know different different programs where things haven't been going a certain way so we've been working to improve them or change things where we can um but again all of this we do have to recognize again the legal landscape we are in what we are able to do as a city um what I love a big sweeping policy to come forward from the federal government that you know gives more ability for this of course I would love you know but there's only so much we can do with what we have right now I don't know if I missed any of the follow-up questions or points there but that um so if I did please please jump in Joe I have a quick quick followup which is is there anything uh that would be an obstacle for for city council to revisit the ordinance and update the thresholds that are listed um it would technically no realistically it's those same situations um we've gone as far as we think we can go um so that would you know that that same barrier would be in the same spot down the line um but were any of that to change there's you know it would have to go through the whole you know city council review process all that you know all you know all feedback things like that so it could happen but again facing the the same restrictions that we might be facing otherwise uh council member Rina and then uh commissioner mki I think I think Erica had her hand up before me I'm sorry it was covered by the the that's okay no worries it's any fine um so sorry I had to drop off the call as I mentioned earlier I had to pop into my son's uh parent teacher conference uh for a second so I missed part of the conversation I'll to catch up on it later um I did want to mention in terms of practical realities or or challenges and I I'm um I'm getting the sense that you know the desire is to to make sure that we are um we are putting things into place that allow us to achieve our our um you know advances our our climate action um allows us to reach our climate action goals um our greenhouse gas emissions I do want to to note that it is this is one of this ordinance and there are a few others but creates huge amounts of tension in our community um and for real really good reasons um and I I think it's important that this commission wrestles with it as well even though our Focus here is to you know make sure that we are advancing our climate action goals that's obviously the largest issue we see our planet or you know um facing our community the largest issue that I hear over and over again is community affordability U and people are really struggling with figuring out how to um how to find a place to live and so this is one of those policies that directly um is at tension with one of our local um biggest local challenges um we're obviously working to address that through incentives and you know rebates and lots of different place ways to reach that um but it is it's a challenge and I I think it's one that you know uh we will just need to continue to wrestle with in relationship to you know anything that impacts our our housing stock our rental stock uh how those um costs impact our community and and how do we advance our goals council member Rina thanks yeah I was uh just thinking about addressing John's suggestion about revie language to to have Council and the administrator review it and I guess I'm trying to think logistically through that John and I don't know if maybe you can provide some some clarity I don't know if your I thought your suggestion was to include that in the ordinance um and I don't I'm trying to think through kind of like technically what that would look like in an ordinance um and so I'm I guess I'm I'm trying to think through what it is your suggest I guess I wonder if you could reiterate what you're suggest suggesting it seems like that type of thing is something we would generally kind of instruct staff to you know every three years evaluate or something like that would be through a resolution rather than through living in the ordinance itself where the the enforcement Falls more on like I I enforcement would be challenging I would think and so that's where I guess I'm trying to think through what your what your suggestion is and how you wanted to achieve that commissioner mki uh let me first address council member rina's comment or question I I agree it probably can't appear in the ordinance or in uh city code or anything like that um this would have to be in an accompanying resolution or a resolution on its own that just uh asks or requires that the city administrator revisit the thresholds uh for example you know every X years on such and such a date or something like that I don't know how the city tracks those kinds of resolutions I'm not so confident that if you look at all these different things that are passed by Council over the years that they actually then are Revisited as they should be but um you know that's why we're also here as a Council or as a commission to remember these kinds of things and to raise the flag back to our Council Lea on that this this time period is up and that there was an agreement that the threshold would be reviews reviewed um I I would be mollified or or I would be satisfied with with something like that um as far as uh the comments that Joe offered as far as what we can and can't do let let's be clear codes affect new building construction energy and building and we're not talking about new buildings we're not putting a requirement on new buildings we're we're asking that landlords make improvements sustainability improvements to the housing that they own we know from Michigan saves that every roughly every $1 in Energy Efficiency um improvements that are made result in $3 Plus in savings so I think the this the affordability question is really not really um a valid argument it's something that we can refute it's not just Michigan saes there's a bunch of other entities that study this um the electrification uh issue is a little bit more difficult because we do know that natural gas is very inexpensive and electrification um in some cases is going to um result in higher in higher uh costs um not to the landlord but to obviously to the the renters but all in all I think what we're asking here for is something that makes our housing more sustainable it's not in conflict with what the city can do based on state codes as As I understood Joe to have said Joe yeah just to comment directly on that and to like while State codes do apply to new buildings there is also um and again I am not a lawyer but from the advice I have been given we have received it it largely the relates to two for a existing building unless that existing building under goes a significant renovation um which is something like you know over 50% of the assessed value they're the codes they are bound by are the codes that were in place when the building was constructed that's one of the tensions that we're dealing with so the you know the existing building in energy code does not just relate to new builds it still has impacts for existing buildings as well so that's what in some cases makes some of the tension a lot harder as well particularly as it relates to existing buildings Joe would you mind just with respect to the third sort of big bucket of questions around the checklist Pathways um there were a number of specific items brought up sort of around you know ranging from things like um everything from EVS to air ceiling to to um electric baseboard uh Heating and and other things and would you be able to sort of comment um on some of the checklist options relative to the overall um the overall Ord sure um and with that before before I go into specifics like I said I'm more than fine to just go through and list out all the different ones go from there um if that would be helpful for folks but um two two things I do want to note of um where to look is one um these these should all be in the packet and if not they certainly were last month and I apologize if I did not get them in this month I'm just trying to confirm that they are in there um but there is the green rental housing um uh points breakdown um checklist Point breakdown and the green rental checklist methodology both of these are in that green rental housing supplemental materials um doc or um docket that's attached in the packet and I would really encourage folks to look through those as I think um one while that doesn't necessarily answer all the questions in the sense of like me talking through them that goes through the general outline for how most of these things took place um the especially the you know the methodology for it for how things were implemented um again as we talked about last month we have you know those um modeled points which come directly from the modeling through red stock we went through and looked at if you do this what level of impact will this have and that's how we got the points for that so for some of them and again I can go into more detail specifically with these um if it would be helpful but just to take you know the electric baseboard heating one for instance it gets those points because it is based around the modeling where if that were to be powered by renewable energy you would see that level of reduction in the greenhouse gas emissions from that that's something that fundamentally cannot happen if you have a furnace or any other sort of fossil fuel based um you know or any sort of gas- based Appliance um so even though yes it might be less efficient itself than say a heat pump it is still something that can be renewably powered and that reduces emissions um that's why it gets those points in that area similarly it does not um you know gas emissions inside the home so that's where we get to that point value from it and you can see that in that checklist Point breakdown where you see you get 13 points of that from that renewable or from the renewable energy which is based on the modeling and then you get those two standard health and safety points um and that's why and that's to be clear that's just anything that is any type of electric heating um while you know when you look into the you know the HVAC category you see that you can get additional points for having a heat pump because it is more efficient we know that and that's why it gets those points stack with each other you get the points for it being an electric heating Appliance and also does cooling um but that's why you get um that's why you get that stacking points there because it is more efficient so it's important to acknowledge that you know even though yes that's not the most efficient form it still can have a benefit and it still gets points and that's why um those are in there similarly with some of the ones uh where we talked about like looking at um you know I'm going to just I'm going to jump and again I can go into specific ones for this but you know um talking about how you know there's not necessarily A stacking level when it comes to the insulation levels um again based on the modeling we we did and we looked at that that's the amount we saw in terms of decreasing greenhouse gas emissions from doing that level of work as well as a little bit for health and safety um when it comes to insulation there is largely you get to a point of diminishing returns uh where it's set at is our 50 if you have an attic R50 if you don't or sorry R50 with an attic R30 if there's not an attic so just roof insulation once you get kind of higher than that you don't like you still obviously you see benefits it gets better but it doesn't get significantly better and so you know if we were to do points on that you'd see like half a point quarter of a point more um so it's not really um that impactful of the difference there based on again the modeling and things we've seen with that and so that's why kind of those don't have that same level of differentiation because it would one be more complicated you got to go through and check also if when it's in the wall it's hard to tell is that R50 is that r60 you know they're they're pretty similar uh so it's not the impact it has isn't worth the complexity that it adds um so like I said I can go into more of these specific ones but in general looking through that um the checklist methodology explains how we went about it and then the checklist Point breakdown shows how like which of those points create that total number number of points there commissioner mki did you have a clarification yes uh real quickly to electric baseb heating I agree with everything Joe said but taking into account what council member Brig said if we're really worried about affordability then we should discount the number of points that are earned by installing electric baseboard heating because that is going to be extreme expensive that's going to be the most expensive way of heat of space heating that anybody can use and so um I I would encourage uh OSI to look at that point total and discount that and not just evaluated based on greenhouse gas savings but if we're thinking of sustainability um is in in its broadest terms that also is in affordability and economic sustainability that's not something that we should be uh advancing thank you commissioner overp yeah so thank you this is interesting um I'm wondering uh first on the baseboard one just because you mentioned it John um I agree with what you're saying but on the other hand as someone who has renovated a really old cabin in the Colorado Rockies um there's no way I could have done it she cheaper than baseboard electrifying um just cuz you know I can't put in Duck work and I can't have a heat pump in every single room kind of thing um and maybe I just had a bad contractor but I think I knew what he was doing um so said there are cases where that is better than leaving in some kind of gas powered uh I'm not saying don't do it I'm saying discount the amount of points that can be earned and nudge people in the right direction yeah but I mean I think I think you're right but I mean maybe the trick would be if you can do a do it if you can't then you can do B um but the other thing is uh my main point though isn't the doesn't the IRA have money for a lot of these things in other words tax credits for heat pumps tax credits for insulation for induction and other energy saving not just Appliance basically but you know home uh decarbonization mechanisms and uh whatever we do you know there should be a little coordination I don't know if there is and knowing what Joe and Missy and team are doing they've already got this in there but you know we should really be highlighting that this money is there and then incentivizing the landlords to use that money because that money won't always be there and we want to make sure that we in Michigan get our chance to really take advantage of it if these guys think they can do nothing um and save a little money that's probably what they'll do Jo yeah that was um a lot of what I was gonna say of part of it where it's again and I I don't want to get too hung up on this because it is you know one point yes that has a decent point value um but to be clear you know the it is not specifically just saying here use baseboard to heat that gets you 15 points that's one of a suweet of options saying electricity is the primary type of energy used for space heating so it's not specifically just saying baseboard heat that is one of the options um but exactly what commissioner overp was just saying there is one there are there you know there's funding out there for all the different types of heat pumps for that there is not for baseboard heating um and so that one pushes and incentivize towards that and two you know with again with the structure of the checklist these points are additive so again there is the electricity is the primary type of energy used for space heating that will get 15 points and that is for those reasons uh that we just talked about um and if you have baseboard heat you stop there you get 15 points for that that's where it goes now again if you have a heat pump which you know even the lowest you know the lowest number in there um is 10 points which is for a low efficiency heat pump with electric backup heat that's another 10 points so that's 25 points total you know an additional 10 points towards that that goal of eventually 80 which is you know 10 points isn't nothing that's an eighth of the points right there and so there is incentivization in those numbers to go towards heat pumps um you know obviously I'm not a landlord I'm not a you know I'm not the one making these financial decisions of what I'm putting in a building or a home but if I'm looking at that and I see how much more points I would get from doing a heat pump compared to just doing baseboard that weighs on you when you're making that that if that's the the sole reason for you making that kind of decision um so there is incentivization both baked into the checklist in terms of the number of points but there is also again the amount of federal funding that is available and we will be heavily heavily pushing all of that um in terms of you know getting that education out there and again in some places um or in some cases with certain types of rental properties they're also eligible for um or some of the City rebates uh we've had like I mentioned last time we have had some rental properties that have taken advantage of the rebates and are getting um heat pumps in those rental units so you know there's with these different types of incentivization both financially and in the checklist structure um you know that that it doesn't fully result in a heavy heavy heavily biased ing towards um you know baseboard heat as a way of of sort of um perhaps moving towards um bringing a a sort of close to to this beginning to bring it close to this discussion I just wanted to ask if any other commission members had any um clarifications or comments um I'll just add from my perspective um briefly as presented I'm inclined to support the resolution at the as it as it currently exists um but I'm certainly open to to um uh language in the resolution around um around uh um follow followup by city council and and and City administrators but um but I also don't think that it's necess necessary I think that I was somewhat encouraged by the call caller Ken Garber at the beginning of this meeting um calling for CER fast and decisive and I sort of think that while this while the thresholds and and all of it may not be fully perfect I think there is a a degree of fast of of speed and decisiveness about about moving forward and getting a program in place that others can start to make sense of and and perhaps start to adopt and and and use to the advantage and so um I will let's see I don't know who had their hand up first but I will uh how about commissioner 11 uh yeah thanks um I guess overall um hearing from people that I respect like commissioner Mery and others um I I do wish it could be stronger I don't know if there's a way we can make the same number of points but make it so you can only do like a certain number of these um activities in combination like the ones that don't really make any infrastructure changes like limit the number those uh limit how many of those you can do to get to the point total um I understand the legal uh issues I I've researched some of it myself and I I do agree that it does apply to existing as well as new construction um I think that's true but what I don't understand is if we're saying we can do what we can do now now why we can't just make it somewhat stronger um I will say as an attorney who's observed um the legal advice that comes out of uh our office um I I think they tend to be conservative I don't mean politically conservative I mean careful about what they allow the city to do and given that this is an emergency situation I would like to push harder and I I don't think that I don't see why we can't be a little tweak this a little bit more make it a little bit stronger right now um and again I I think we're just being we're I've seen this too many times where we allow the legal department to tell us what we can and can't do and I I respect their opinion but not all lawyers not all judges are going to have the same opinion um I'd like to see us be a little more aggressive and push the issue a little forward a little more commissioner colen Garcia thank you commissioner harp and uh this has been a really um valuable discussion for me listening to the different perspectives and it has me looking at um like the um the enforcement aspect of this uh so reading um chapter 105 uh uh where it talks about the um period between inspections and says it shall be no longer than two and a half years so um just getting getting every unit every building inspected there could be buildings that are right now being inspected and then if this ordinance passes then it's going to be another you know like up to two and a half years before they have an inspection before they have to do any compliance so if we would have you know like stronger like or a higher threshold of points and obligation maybe maybe it could help it could help pull us you know closer to so it's going to be we have less than six years left before we reach 2030 and you know as far as like having two cycles of inspections happen you know by then that's not going to be able to happen and so we won't be able to track Improvement so if we have a a baseline of all the rental units in the next two and a half years between let's say today and two and a half years then then how how do we know we're making any improvements so I'm just looking at it from that perspective right now and and hoping that maybe that could be something that Council can consider maybe shortening that time period understanding that it would take more inspectors it'll cost the city more but just looking at different ways of approaching this that's what I have commissioner overc thanks uh yeah we have some ideas here and I just wondered if we can uh in the words of commissioner 11 be a little more aggressive and I think uh commissioner Goen Garcia just came up with one idea um and I think that combined with what commissioner mky was saying earlier of trying to figure out a way to make it clear to landlords that the longer they wait and the further they get away from this period when there all this money sitting on the table uh the more urgent it will be to decarbonize their units I don't know if there a way to do these a couple of these things the last one I like I still like which I don't know if anyone else liked was my suggestion that we that the we are being you know the we shorten the period I like that and then we we also between inspections but we also put it in a public domain so people can get a sense of what the truly green rentals are and the Not So green rentals are and let the P the market help us out thank you other other other comments or clarifications I'm I'm um trying to think myself about how we uh sort of bundle bundle this together um and how we should proceed next and I'm open to suggestions um as moving to sort of wrap up discussion here shortly um commissioner mury perhaps this is something that could Beed reflected in the resolution of support where we request that OSI together with uh the city administrator's input and Council review the threshold of 80 points whether that could be higher or not and that the threshold be re-evaluated um and that could be as we discussed ear and another resolution every X years based on the report that is supposed to be issued at the that the ordinance itself calls for um and progress in making the kinds of upgrades that are are necessary I I think that can address a lot of the points that have been discussed up till now um I don't want to go into a lot of other details that are in the email that I sent and in the comments that I sent before the last meeting but I think there's some really important points that still have not been addressed for example um how are fines going to be levied are they going to be on a per unit basis or a building basis or some kind of uh combination of the two um what about EV charging there's no mention at all about EV charging is all EV charging for all of these rental units going to be provided in uh with chargers that are um in the public right away uh what about apartment complexes with 200 units where they're not on public streets are people going to have to get in their car and drive to a public charging unit all the time that's a huge disincentive for P for EV charging there's just a whole lot of other issues in this document that I speaking now to our Council leaon that in my view cannot be ignored um there's questions about how co-ops in sororities and fraternities are going to be handled they have different sleeping Arrangements I have not seen how those that's addressed in the ordinance and these questions have not been answered so I I'm going to be quiet um from here on out until we talk to about the resolution I just think there is a lot there are a lot of things that still need to be resolved before I would support a resolution of support um I guess asking cheerart I am willing to go through and answer all of those questions I have answers for them all these things have been considered and are addressed in some way whether that feels satisfactory or not I I can't say but they have all been addressed but just wondering if that is what would be helpful to everyone I'm happy to go through all of these if that would be helpful can that be done in writing I mean you had you had all of these points a month ago so between we ago and now that there could have been something written in response to all of these questions where we would have had all that prior to the meeting and we could have voted tonight I'm happy to go through them part of that is difficult in the sense of again what is open meetings and accessible from that manner um so that is in part why I'm happy to discuss it now in an open meeting setting if that would be helpful I think part of what I think um there's a number there's a number of probably technical points in in the in the email as well um one of the questions that we might deal with was whether or not we wanted to um potentially add uh anything into the into the resolution itself um and maybe that is or is not addressed by by some of the responses Joe I don't know if you're able to to comment on that in ter just in terms of I think what commissioner mki was respecting was was commenting on with respect to the um OSI and City administrator input on reviewing the threshold and re-evaluating and and sharing progress on making upgrades yeah those could those could certainly all all be part of it um as well as you know if anything were to change or if something needed to change in the regulations document or anything like that or you know Point values things like that certainly all could take place um the other thing I will note broad sweeping thing especially as part of some of it with how you know units are defined how things happen in places like a sority things like that all of it is based on the existing rental inspection process that we've talked about it's in you know chapter 105 specifically you at 511 um all the information is in there for how those things are already done with the inspection how the units are determined how they inspected everything will fall in line with that existing thing nothing is changing nothing is um being gotten rid of it's all falling in line with that so um for next steps um in terms of the resolution that we've been discussing on the agenda today um Joe could you remind me of the process that we might undertake if we wanted to add add something to that resolution um yes and council members please correct me if I'm wrong because I forget this as well um believe we need to open discussion on the resolution we can vote on changes within it um and then once we're satisfied can might have to go back for a second reading but please someone jump in just in case I'm mistaken on any of that thanks Joe um so I'd like to suggest that we move on um from this discussion and um and potentially um open discussion on the resolution itself I I see a a nod from um uh motion from council member BRS is there a second second yep okay all those all and do we need to vote on that as well no okay sorry sorry did what was the original I I believe we moved and seconded something already um prior to the discussion we just had was there an action we needed to take I think it was just discussion on the information itself gotcha so we okay so it was probably we probably didn't okay yeah and so now we're now we're moving in second in on the on on discussion on the resolution itself um and any potential amendments to that resolution Council membera actually John ra his hand but I was just going to say this is so now we've moved on to the resolution so now it be the time to propose amendments if folks have them or open that discussion um it sounds like that's where some of this convers wanted to go and so um I guess I would just ask we have this rule at the council table I don't believe that it's a rule in your bylaws but if there are any amendments made it could be helpful to provide them in writing to Joe so that he has them so um if folks are thinking of things my suggestion would be to maybe start drafting something that you could provide to him in writing commissioner mki um yes if I could just add to that what my recollection is of action that we've done in cases like this in the past is when we've made minor resolutions um it may be a little bit difficult with Joe's technical difficulties um but I believe the resolution um received the first reading in our last meeting so we we could approve it in this meeting and if uh we so desired there could be changes to the resolution that could be made in real time um where someone simply for example added a resolve Clause that called for um for example a that the checklist pathway uh threshold be reviewed for possible um higher value and at least initially and that uh Council together with City Administration look at what those thresholds are and the results of the prr program um every two years or something like that something to that effect we could either do that now and vote that may as I said be a little bit difficult maybe the better proposal is to do what Joe suggested or what the council member Rina suggested and that is to submit a possible language uh that could then be voted on at the next meeting admittedly that's another month's delay just just for clarity I I was suggesting in either situation I think it could be helpful to provide them in writing to Joe so that you can make the the resolution or make the motion but rather than him trying to capture it in real time if you can draft it up and email it to him for him to include I think that would be helpful even if we do that now rather than at the next meeting I'm I'm trying to type up what John was saying real quick and I'm going to fire this off to Joe that's great and I'm I'm I'm um I've got the resolution up in a word doc ready to screen share in case we need to screen share that in just a second as well and I'm sort of doing similar that's okay with you all yes thank you and again sorry I don't everything else is now working except zoom on my computer so don't know it might be better to send those Resolute that language straight to chair harp then so he can include it in I under normal circumstances I'd be willing to do this but I've got uh a phone sitting on top of my laptop so that my video is going through and I really don't have the capability to type this up so uh if somebody else is willing to do it great um if someone would like me to do it I'd be happy to do it but it have to be considered before the next or in our next meeting I'm gonna go ahead and share my screen here um and what I have highlighted is um a quick draft which I don't think I have exactly right um but as things come in I may be able to um add to that sorry let me let me zoom in just a little bit for you all [Music] um we might just want to uh for a point of clarification we everything the city council does we do through the administrator and administrator assigns that so um you could for Simplicity sake instead of say request OSI with City input you could just say encourages the city council to you know direct the administrator or to review the threshold of 80 points or something like that that that should probably read the the checklist pathway threshold because there are we didn't discuss there's a her uh pathway um there another thing that we didn't discuss was a recommendation from Jan Culbertson also look at an energy star uh threshold as a as another path pathway um I mean I don't know if that we want reflect that in the in the resolution but um at least in this particular case it's the checklist passway that's proba DEC capitalized checklist pathway all right so I have a comment if I may yeah the the increasing the frequency to every more than every two and a half years um I understand exactly where carleen's coming from it was also concern in one of the documents that I submitted but we have to recognize that that's an administrative burden on everybody so I don't know that it's realistic to to do that I mean we can include that in the resolution or not I'm I'm skeptical about doing that um what I would prefer to see reflected in here is that we review the threshold initially when the ordinance is enacted and to review um the threshold and it could just be thresholds could could potentially be not just this particular pathway but other Pathways that the the thresholds be reviewed um for example it could just be every two years and um up till 2030 uh or something like that um for possible uh modifications or yeah something to that effect carlen I don't know if you want to push back on the two and a half years or not Joe yeah the one thing I'll not is similar what commissioner Mercy just said that that two and a half years is just as much you know for the general cycle as it is for again where the um yeah City inspectors are at it takes roughly that amount of time to go through and do all those inspections um and so you know again you're welcome to put whatever else you would like to in there but just noting yeah the the only way to be able to do inspections on a higher frequency and again because this would count for inspections for all inspections it's not just green Roa housing um so there would need to be more you know inspectors doing that kind of that kind of work so we could obviously review it at any frequency that doesn't change anything but yeah purely having that cycle um it's it's broader than just green rental housing uh clarification on this the um in is is the for the language would it be to direct the city to revie the city administrator to review the check Miss paway pathway um is there a when in that statement and I believe there was something mentioned at the outset of the ordinance or um or at some frequency um there's not directly anything saying we're reviewing it at you know at at this interval um rather it's just as as every inspection takes place that information is put into the system and that can be reviewed at at any time there's nothing specific spefic um on that if I may um after pathway the word b I don't think is necessary um and uh as to your question and and Joe's comment um I would like to see possible I don't know what you mean by modifications I think what we talked about is modifications on a certain interval that's the word that that that Joe mentioned which I think is a good one and we could Define either what that interval is or we could leave that to um city council working together with the city administrator to Define what that uh interval might be given that we have a 2030 Target and um it we obviously don't want it to be too short but we also want it don't want it to be too long that seems like the right approach to leave it um to leave it to be defined um commissioner 11 yeah I mean I I say we put like some sort of date on the initial time that they're going to do it and then after that it could be like at some sort of regular interval that they determine I don't know maybe like no later than two or three years after the program has been in place or something like that and then at regular intervals after that but commissioner colen Garcia I think you're on mute sorry I would be interested in having the checklist review occur prior to this being released um and then the inter interval review remember what Joe was was sharing with us in terms of all the changes that have happened in the last few years with regards to policy with regards to um you know the transition of the grid with regards to technology things are going to be uh may be being made available and so having the interval be greater than 2 years uh we will be not taking advantage of opportunities so I think it should be shorter maybe 18 months I know it sounds aggressive but it's it's it 2030 is around the corner commissioner msky and and I I also look to um Joe if there's a suggestion or or council member Briggs um but uh commission commissioner mki and then council member Briggs I support caren's comments and concerns I would recommend that we not Define the interval that that we leave that up to city council and uh the city administrator with o input to come to an agreement I mean also this as we discussed involves just the entire process of um assessments and everything else and we don't know all the details of those so I would just say you know at the onset and on a defined interval okay thank you uh council member BRS yeah thank you um so yeah I just sorry I'm having some video issues too um so I guess I would just I understand the urgency and the the desire and I think that it's being sort of communicated in in this resolved Clause I just um want to remind folks that the the whole purpose of the office of sustainability and Innovation um it it is built around achieving our our our and um our climate action and they've developed our our our climate action plan um H zero plan and um in in collaboration with the community it's been you know it is the purpose that guides them in their work on an everyday basis and so um this is you know I think that regardless if we they are evaluating the progress towards this as well so I know we want to make sure that this is happening um but I also think that you know just a reminder that this is this is happening as part of their their daily work plan as well is to you know or their their annual work plan as well is to be evaluating what is working what is not working um and looking to make modifications to improve upon that and and looking at what changes are happening in state law and you know different incentives and making modifications there so um you know I think this is this is going to move forward I wonder if if a is is is directing the city administrator versus working with the city city administrator a more appropriate uh or better fit for the for for this Clause it's okay we just we use the the language of directing the city administrator it's fine I mean I I wouldn't over you know sure it's fine as is I know it sounds like very direct it's I mean it's it's harsh language but it's it is just kind of uh council member Rina yeah I was just going to add to that I think your your action is directed at city council and you're encouraging city council um I would definitely say that uh we have had this issue in the past two commissions cannot direct City staff but you're encouraging Council to do so and that's fully within your scope thank you so um I'm G to stop sharing screen if that's okay if everyone has a I'll I'll email I'm going to try to email this back um here shortly um as well um and were there any other discussions around the um the resolution as as it currently exists or amendments to to the resolution commissioner mki so I'm going to support the resolution because I'd like to see a program go into effect I'm not happy with the program as it's designed I hope Council and OSI and City administrators seriously look at revisions um but we have to keep this all in context um this this program is two and a half years behind schedule that was laid out in the a20 plan this program is a huge lever and as long as we do nothing that lever is just sitting there blowing in the wind this involves 8,500 buildings and 31,500 units as was added to the resolution we have to do something and this shouldn't be just something that makes makes it look good that we've done something this has actually drive action and hopefully this as was discussed earlier with all the other programs that the city and the federal government and the state and others have in programed they will work in concert to really Drive changes in Behavior the other thing that I want to mention to everyone is uh uh chair harp has indicated that we're likely to review the greenhouse gas inventory the greenhouse gas inventory shows that emissions dropped 1% last year in the city um that does not reflect new housing that is coming on board and will create new emissions um we've been averaging roughly one to one Orum me one and a half to 2% per year um that goes back to the year 2000 if you look at the simple inventory if you look at the full inventory it's in that that range the upper end of that range since 2015 we need to do something we need to do it fast and I think this moves this forward but it should only really move forward if this is something that's done that is really going to drive results thanks for the opportunity to comment thank you um council member breaks yeah I'm just gonna um these are there's no doubt about it um reaching these goals is is challenging espe as we're having a growing growing Community um we lack the state tools to do this we lack some of the resources that we need to do it is absolutely challenging um I can you know I it would be we we could we could decide we we're not going to build any more housing in our community um and it would be a lot easier for us to advance those goals right in terms of we're just dealing with our existing housing stock and we're not dealing with that and so I think again I just point to there this this is a major tension in our community we're going to wrestle with it in this in our own commission and I just I'm going to always kind of bring us back to that other piece of we are trying to address um Community affordability adding more housing Supply and this is absolute tension with this and we're trying we're wrestling the best we can with it you know I certainly look to this commission to help us figure out how we do that better um we're looking to a lot of commissions planning commissions working on this you know a lot of commissions are trying to put their heads into this space but um you know I those numbers I want you to imagine what happens when that housing gets built in another Community with with less focus on on that and and when those people are are driving into the community from someplace else um and so although we are we have our our our goals are you know I think we're going to have to continue considering how you know are we are we using the right measures to examine our progress um is also something I think we need to um be always keeping an eye on in terms of our a20 plan um you know are we are we tracking the right numbers I realize we've been at this a while and I I think we skipped the Break um part of the agenda um as well um and so um I think what i' what I'd like to do though is is ask if um there's uh any um I'd like to move towards closing the discussion on the resolution itself um and uh ask if there's any um uh perhaps a motion to bring it to a vote and and please please uh correct me on process if I'm if I'm uh missing anything um in in that I I think we just need to still vote to accept the amendment before thank you y [Music] um I move we accept the amendment as proposed I second it thank you and um so moved by commissioner colen gar and seconded by commissioner mki um all of those in favor of accepting the amendment um and I'll just read that very briefly resolve the energy commission encourages city council to direct the city administrator to review the checklist pass pathway for possible higher thresholds or modifications at the outset of the program and defined interval all those in favor please raise your hand and say I I all those opposed please raise your hand and say nay seeing none opposed the motion passes is there a motion to move towards a vote um on the proposed resolution sorry you've actually already moved it so that's why we're having the discussion yep okay thank you um and so I think now we can take a vote is that is that accurate okay um with respect to the ordinance to amend chapter 105 of title 8 of the code of the city of an arbor to support Greening The Greening of the rental market um all those in favor of the resolution uh please raise your hands and say I I I all of those opposed please raise your hand say no seeing none opposed the motion passes thank you everyone um it's now 7:48 um what I might propose is that we take a a three minute break um if possible and then come back at uh 8 uh 751 and um we'll move on to the rest of the agenda we're just about done y e e e Joe just a quick point of clarification um You' mentioned the roll call is that something that we need to go back to or before the staff report or I think we're okay okay I can I can see it every one so I think we're okay I I think the only issue would be I think John has noted that on with the agenda and um for those of you who might be coming back uh there was just a quick note that if you are not um calling in from an arbor if you could note that you're elsewhere um that would be appreciated we will move on to the staff report of the agenda Joe do you mind yep um some of these are similar to previous ones but um still relevant of just noting again and specifically as it you know relates to this as we talked about EV Chargers as well um with the goal of increasing these um EV Chargers the commercial EV charger program does provide an opportunity for commercial and multifam property owners in an arbor to receive up to four Free level two EV Chargers um to learn more about the program and view the application and apply uh you can visit OSI a2gov.org charger program um another that can kind of overlap is um for homeowners lawn care service providers and property managers or anyone else who is interested in learning more about electric lawn care or sustainable lawn care in general they can join um the Alla sustainab Innovations on October 21st at Cobblestone farm from 4: to 6:00 p.m.

[Music] welcome to the Atlantic County Institute of Technology the school for career and college readiness in Atlantic County he acit is a nationally recognized Blue Ribbon school and has been repeatedly voted as a best high school by US News and World reports with an active student body of over 1,800 students acit offers a rewarding hands-on experience and career learning opportunities preparing Atlanta County students for higher education as well as immediate job opportunities acit offers the complete High School experience with a large curriculum Athletics extracurricular activities and an active staff of Industry professionals who are dedicated to our students success and their ability to pursue what they love each career program is developed based on current industry and career Readiness practice standards as set forth by the New Jersey Department of Education career programs provide students with Hands-On exposure and experimentation supported by industry guest speakers and career field immersion opportunities in addition to structured learning outside of the classroom the career programs also offer their own set of eligibility for certifications and or postsecondary advancement beyond graduation additionally all students are eligible for various apprenticeship programs structured learning opportunities work-based learning opportunities college and other postsecondary education credits acit offers career programs in Air Force jrc [Music] Aviation studies automotive technology Building Trades Plumbing HVAC electrical and carpentry cosmetology [Music] computer Aid at drafting and design computer science and [Music] programming culinary [Music] arts dental assistant fashion [Music] design Health [Music] Sciences law and Public [Music] Safety Medical Assistant math engineering and science [Music] performing arts dance drama and vocal media and [Music] Graphics [Music] welding in addition to Career program accreditations and licenses students also earn their high school diploma Court classes of English History Math Science and World Language are offered in college prep honors and advanced placement acit offers 17 AP courses 34 dual enrollment courses and over 30 electives outside the classroom acit offers a wide variety of sports and extracurricular activities providing students with a full High School experience with over 30 clubs and growing students have the opportunity to pursue a wide variety of special interests acit offers freshman JV and varsity Level Sports in the following areas baseball basketball bowling cheerleading cross [Music] country crew football golf indoor track [Music] softball soccer track and field [Music] volleyball if acit does not offer a sport students May participate in their home school program last year acit graduated 404 students with a 98% graduation rate 76% of our students were College Bound 20% career bound 2% military and 2% to the trade school acit Has Broken Ground on the $53 million $1 133,000 ft Expansion Project with the expected completion date of March 2025 the new facility will allow acit to introduce new career programs in aviation maintenance welding and advanced fabrication and exercise science it will also provide space to expand the existing dental assistant medical assistant health sciences and culinary arts programs to the campus the new three-story multi-purpose building will house 16 new CTE Labs a 50% increase in addition to ancillary spaces to meet curricular and student needs this includes a cafeteria integrated into the expanded culinary arts program administrative spaces as well as a gym and simulation and performance labs to support the Health Sciences and exercise science programs AC T's information sessions will be in person on October 24th from 3:30 p.m.

e e e all right okay everyone welcome to tonight's secondary schools Churchill and the high school AI parent University night really excited to have the parents who were joining us here and those who were able to join us on the live stream to share some really great information excuse me and some exciting things we have going on uh this year to start off the Year this is a you know my name is her Palo I guess we should start with introductions her Palo you've been receiving a lot of emails from me lately so I appreciate you reading those I'm the supervisor of educ ational technology here in East Brunswick this is my 19th year in the district which really exciting I got my start here at hamers shold not in this building and the original building that used to run alongside uh Ru Lane in a little bit of a different configuration as a social studies teacher and then I moved to the high school to teach uh different levels of History everything from AP uh and all the levels of courses uh elective courses and things of that nature which was a lot of fun and then I became the instr structional coach when we were looking at going one to one and doing some uh investigations of our learning management system canvas that we use now I was department chair for social studies and Media Services for two and a half years and um when this job was created through my hat in the ring and presented the vision that we've been able to execute I think pretty well over the last year plus and we're really excited about what we have going on in Ai and educational technology here in East Brunswick couple things I just want to point out there's my contact information up on the slide and you can see it uh at home on the live stream as well the all the information that's shared tonight the slides that I'm going to go through the video that's uh the live stream that's being recorded will be available uh on demand which will be a great resource for anyone who uh wasn't able to make it out or wasn't able to make the live stream I know you know I had to race my son to soccer before uh tonight's event so I know a lot of folks have stuff going on and totally get that so if they're unable to be here you can tell them about the uh the video on demand and um they could always reach out if they have any questions the AI Center website's right there you can also just type in EB Center on Google and it's the first result that pops up which is pretty cool and then the edtech website has some other resources there uh and information that can be very helpful so I just wanted to point everyone in that direction so let's jump in and get started so when we talk about AI most people um you know think about the first definition that's up there right and then you know when we think about AI That's started to really impact our society and our world and and the the you know what our students are using in school what we're really talking about is generative AI right AI that can create content uh you know for years we've had um we've had apps like shazan where you you're in CVS picking up something and a song comes on you're like I haven't heard this song in a while what song is this he click Shazam and in about four or five seconds of you what songs playing um I know I'm not the only one that likes to do that it's always a fun game and like oh I was I was way off or oh I knew that was the song um you know we've had Siri and Alexa and hey Google for years I don't want to set anyone's phone off in here but you know we've had artificial intelligence elements for years um you know we've had different you know technologies that use aspects of artificial intelligence but the generative piece I think you know was one that was really jarring when people could type something into a chap bot and it created something that and it seemed like it was thinking and being creative and and doing things you know making music or writing stories I think that was that was pretty jarring uh for a lot of people and that's the PE piece that when we when we're talking about AI now I think that's really what most people mean is Gen AI so I'd like to share these definitions these are from the state of New Jersey's website and um they're very important but one of the things that I think are also important as we're having this conversation with parents and with students with educat ators and community members is really you know I want people to think of AI as a tool and just like every one of the tools up there you know depending on what problem you're trying to solve is going to also depend on what tool you're going to use to solve it right you know sometimes you're going to use that little the pickaxe at the end there always makes me think of the movie sha Shank Redemption and Andy duin trying to Chisel through out of the prison so you know I guess if you're trying to do what Andy defrain did you want to use the tool all the way to the left here does anyone know what the tool on the right is anyone know what that is that is a glass cutter that's a glass cutter um so you know obviously if you're trying to um you know do do a project where you're trying to you know trim down some wood or something you're not going to use a glass cutter right you're not going to use a wrench when you need to use a screwdriver you know AI is just like every one of these tools it's going to be you know it's it's may be more useful than other tools for multiple projects but it's not the end all Beall for you know that's going to solve every problem or get you the answer for every you know um thing that you're trying to solve but it's a really powerful Tool uh it can be kind of Swiss army knife in a way where it has a lot of different aspects to it but there's no substitute I think for your personal creativity and for your voice but if a tool can help you get there faster and I think gen gen has a lot of capabilities to do that that's a pretty exciting place to be so I'm going to tell a little story before we jump in and you might be thinking what the heck does mustard have to do with with AI well I like to share this story because this was what clinched it for me and got me to you know there's a problem that involved mustard that made me think okay maybe there's something to this to this AI chat G PT stuff so what happened was we were at my house and I have I have three children nine six and four and you know like a lot of nights it's busy you're trying to make something for dinner you have all this food you're like we're not ordering out like we're going to make food and I don't know somehow Maybe over Co or different sales or barbecues where you get the three pack or the two pack of like the condiments for a barbecue you the ketchup always goes quick you get you you use the katchup very quickly but you end up with like mustard and relish and things so somehow we ended up with like seven mustards at my house and I had a total like Dad moment I'm like that's it we're using the mustard like the mustard I don't care what we do with it we're going to do something with mustard we're not wasting it you know totally total dad moment right so I'm like what am going to do I don't I've never been a really big fan of mustard we made a lot of spaghetti and meatballs in my house growing up um you know use mustard on hot dogs but yeah what am I going to do with all this mustard oh I know what I'm going to try this chat gbt thing and I'm going to ask it what I can do with this mustard what do we have in here we got chicken got this okay I have the following items in my fridge and I have a lot of mustard what can I make for dinner that's not going to take forever um please give me five suggestions click the button and I get a list of you know five recipes like I asked for and I was like wow this stuff sounds pretty good that that sounds pretty good I didn't know mustard mustard is a great marinade you mix it with some balsamic vinegarette dressing and a couple spices and it's a pretty quick simple easy and quite tasty dinner so um for me after that moment I was like okay I think I think this there might be something with this gen AI this Chachi PT thing like I don't understand it but that's really cool and I think that that's something that is a uh a valuable lesson for all of us to think about is you know if you're on the fence about this still I totally respect it and I think that's a good place to be I always tell people if you're only excited about AI you haven't played with it enough but if you're only skeptical and scared of AI you haven't played with it enough either you have to have a little bit of of both and I think that's a survival skill generally in the Northeast here a little healthy skepticism go a long way but I think if we all have our mustard moment where we like all right well even if I just it for this how much better is my life going to be or how much easier are certain things my life going to be and I think when it comes to making dinner and not wasting food I think that's a good place to start and for me it allowed me to continue the journey and try different things and then apply it to work related problems or helping teachers and and and improving my workflow and things like that and for me I was like okay there's definitely something here this is going to be a powerful gamechanging tool so I would encourage everyone watching on the live stream stream and everyone here to find your mustard moment if you haven't already or um afterwards I'd love to hear from some of the folks here if you what your mustard moment uh was so what I want to go through now before I jump into some of the the things that we're doing that I'm really proud of and really excited about and some things that are getting us some really great attention um you know in the region and um you know I was I was lucky enough to be able to speak at an AI conference in New York City this Saturday um with another Su with a superintendent in another District in in um in New Jersey Randolph uh and some other Educators in the New York area and people are you know a lot of districts are saying well how did you do this and we're trying to catch up to where you're getting to and you know can we can we work together talk about it absolutely so I'm really excited about what we have going on but I wanted to start with a little bit of like for parents and folks watching at home like H how can I use this like you know just in my everyday daily life so I have a couple like four or five examples I want share with you and then some screen videos screen capture videos that I took that um I think will show you some some of the power of what AI can do and if you're familiar with this stuff that's great it's going to be a great like refresher maybe it'll give you a different take on it if it's a new um if this is new or you're like I never thought to use it you know jump on the bandwagon there's plenty of room and uh I think you're going to get a lot of really um great information out of this so we talk about drafting emails there's a couple of things that AI can really help you with um it said talks about tone about content about length you know to write a really good email can take a long time and you know in in my business here as a as a supervisor we deal a lot with parents we're deal sometimes we're emailing students we're emailing community members I deal a lot with different vendors and you know it can take a long time to make sure I'm asking the right questions that I'm not going on too long you know you tone sometimes is hard to to get right an email I see some nodding right that's a you know like oh I didn't think I was being sarcastic I didn't think it would be received that way and sometimes it really wasn't but it depends sometimes on the mood of the person or what have you but wouldn't it be great if you could run a draft to your email through an AI tool and you could ask it check for tone uh check for spelling check for um length you know this looks a little long can you make it one paragraph instead of two or three and that's absolutely what you can do and I think one of the examples I'm going to show here has to do with um you know if you wanted to email your uh one of your um child's teachers about a homework rate and um you know you can give it as much information or a little bit of information you can describe the situation so I want I want everyone to watch this prompt here uh and you'll see the example that I'm going to use to help you craft an email write an email from my child's 8th grade history teachers teacher asking about a zero on the Civics homework I did watch him do it told me turned it in and you see that it creates the email there with about a sentence and this is Google's Gemini and in Google's Gemini you click that button you can copy the text and then go to your email whether it's Gmail this is Outlook you paste it right into the email and if you like the uh subject you take that copy paste it right into the subject and then the next phase of this is you know you add in the the import the important details right and you also make sure that the email speaks with your voice now this is a pretty straightforward direct email some emails have more of a um you know they're more specific maybe it's about a more sensitive topic or things like that um so you you want to make sure that you're being specific and that this speaks with your voice I think that's one of the biggest lessons we talk with students about we I talk with the staff about all the time is that this is great and it it saves you a lot of time but you can't just copy paste it without making some some changes and you have to make sure that that it's the email speaks with your voice that it sounds like it's coming from you right so in that example you had a you know that's a pretty straightforward request right and very quickly sent that email you can make some changes add your child's name uh make sure the salutations if you're not somebody that uses his warm regards or best you know maybe you just like to do uh thank you at the end you know make sure it sounds like you still but that's a pretty powerful time saer right there now another example you know about the revised email sometimes you know we have situations that um you know can can be very frustrating as a parent sometimes we may feel like uh you know our children aren't being heard in class or maybe uh a situation where a grade wasn't given fairly um or that a zero was given and you're very upset you know and and I want to make this clear that I think that you know we want to be honest and direct with teachers and with administrators about how we feel but we also want to make sure that we're getting closer to a resolution right and sometimes when we fire off that angry email it might feel good in that moment but I know I've I've done one or two of those emails and in the moment you're like yeah like all right I really told them and then you kind of calm down afterwards and you're like that's not that wasn't really helpful like that's not really going to get us closer to a resolution um you know there's a way to be honest and direct but not go too far right so I want to encourage everyone always be direct be honest be straightforward but I think that when we have respectful communication especially when we're talking about trying to help our children through whatever difficulty or struggle or situation they're in you know when we have that respectful cordial and direct communication we can really really make a difference and we can really help get children what they need so you know I want to show this example but I wanted to preface it with that with that comment because I do think that that's important so here's an example of like me like an example me V in a little bit to chat gbt I'm very upset fix it now and I ask it to revise it so it goes through and I hope this message finds you well I understand sometimes technical issues and misunderstandings can occur or maybe the mistake was made right so it cleaned up that that anger or that that that just kind of raw feeling and emotion and it cleaned it up a little bit for me and it allowed me that once again go back in copy paste it I can make some edits for the sake of time I didn't do as many edits as maybe I would to kind of throw in some specifics about a situation but I wanted to give everybody kind of an idea of how it can you know you can go from like a 10 on the anger scale and get it down to you know like a three or I think a three is is fine for this or a four where you want to make sure that the zero gets corrected if it was a mistake or you know maybe there was a different of opinion about how the homework was supposed to be done or you know you can get to a resolution for this situation pretty quickly without it escalating you know the other thing I wanted to mention about these situations and encourage folks to do as much as this is about AI is you know if an email if if one or two emails back and forth with a teacher or supervisor uh isn't getting uh a resolution fast I think the next email should be let's set up a time to talk on the phone and I found that that's a big big thing whether whether I'm having communication troubles with one of my colleagues or or uh you know teacher and we're just trying to connect on the thing and emails aren't working like hey uh what's a good time to give you a call and it's like oh oh yeah yeah we're oh we're good okay here's yeah oh I here's the here's the thing I meant to send you or or here's the idea um that we had and this is what I oh okay that makes a lot of sense um so I wanted to throw that in there as well like and I'm a big believer in a in a blend of the old school with the new school um but I think this is really powerful uh you know tool at our disposal to keep the temperature at a place where we can be productive and helpful and help kids and help each other um you know sometimes a grade gets put in a zero by mistake the teacher's putting that grade in sometimes there's a different issue um but we want to keep that communication uh cordial and uh helpful this is a a different example uh I think I skipped a slide here hold on here we go so one of the other things on that list was about like communication s with um like credit card companies or in this case like a property manager so let's say that you have a leaky sink you know and you're in in your apartment and uh you want to try to get the property manager to fix it well this is um this is co-pilot you saw chaty in the last example and in co-pilot I basically explained in one sentence I live in apartment you know my apartment's leaky uh the sink hasn't been fixed I um you know I'm using towels to sop up the leak but um can you help me and I asked chat jbt to help me write that email and um boom I have urgent requests to fix the Leaky sync the property manager uh there listed very simple message cordial I asked it in the prompt you be be polite but direct you know a leaky syn can cause a lot of damage um Can can know you know germs and other things is very inconvenient so Communications like this I think are another area um the one of the other things that was listed there before was you know communicating with the cable company uh or a fraudulent charge you know a lot of credit card companies have those things through the websites if you have if you have trouble with articulating those points or getting them refined these tools are fantastic for that and you could see how quick and easy with a few adjustments you have that email ready to go and you can communicate very easily so whether it's your child's teacher your property manager the mortgage company the credit card company uh Comcast uh or variet or whoever it is uh these tools can really help us with our communication and help us you know instead of spending all this time writing an email you give it one or two sentences and It prepares that email for you which is really cool okay couple more examples uh this is a big one you know homework assistance for kids and and you'll see I included an example I used um you know not that long ago with my fourth grade daughter who's doing Mental Math um which is pretty cool um so homework assistance you know when we're talking about getting guiding questions or even project ideas you know one of the big things I've talked with parents about and even students about this uh when it comes to to geni is using the tool to help us find the answers but not having it do the work for us and I think there's a big difference between those things these tools can be really helpful planning outlining tools uh generating ideas hey I have an idea for this project does this sound good what if I try this will this work are there any examples and you know there's a difference between doing that and write me a five paragraph essay on you know the fall of Rome or whatever it is uh and then trying to copy paste it and say that that's your work um so I think that this is one of the areas for parents where like look you know I'm I came up as a history teacher I know some things about technology right my my wife is a math teacher so I think we have those two subject areas pretty pretty well covered um but even even in those situations we don't always we're not in the classroom we're not sure exactly how the teacher is teaching all the specifics about a uh how to do certain problems or about meiosis or whatever it might be in science class but you could use AI to help you help help you help your child and you'll see some prompting techniques I use like how can I help my child with their homework without just giving them the answer and you and you put that right into this to the chatbot and it'll it'll walk you through it so I'm excited to show you a couple of those examples and then you know I did my mustard bit before so you'll see a couple there's some food examples there um you know I always say be careful trust but verify is going to be one of the phrases I use when it comes to content and when it comes to food like you know when it says you know different dietary needs always consult doctors and I don't you know I want I'm not that kind of doctor right so consult with professionals and all that before you make any you know if it makes any kind of drastic or odd um you know suggestions always uh check on those things you know it's very important you know you want to fact check everything but um it can get you some really great information and you'll see that in a second so those are two more areas so here's one uh an algebra one problem that I I talked to one of the um to some of the Math teachers and got a couple problems and uh used Claude which is another AI tool help me assist my child non answer this question without doing the problem for them copy and paste or typed in the problem there and so far you see hopefully all the different AI tools do it a little bit differently a little bit of a different interface so gives you directions to help your child with this problem ask to identify the important information discuss the concept give them time to set uh guide them to set up the equation help them with the unit conversion if needed encourage them to perform the calculations remind them about rounding and then I was going to stop the video at the end right here but then when I saw would you like any specific suggestions for explaining the any of these steps and I said yes and I you'll see I'm like you know what let's see what happens yes let's ask it to explain those steps in more detail took me a couple seconds to typ that yes please provide those examples or explanations and not a great prompt but you'll see that the answer is certainly better than my prompt and it walks you through how to work through that problem and how to help that your your child solve that problem step by step what did what do they mean by step one what do they mean by discussing the average speed the unit conversion so you can sit right next to your child they're going to do the work they're going to be going step by step you're not giving them the answer but you're helping them get closer to the answer and you see in every one of the Gen tools you have a different ability to copy and paste right into a Google doc or Microsoft Word doc or an email um an email box uh that message box so as I said I I had the opportunity I was I record as I Was preparing these things my daughter then had her homework and I and I she's very frustrated got done soccer practice and she dances and she's involved in 17 different things and um like all right we should be getting ready for bed like we got this we got to wrap this up and uh but I'm like all right you know I want to do the problem for I me practice what I preach I always feel like in leadership whenever you give a suggestion to someone you're usually given within 24 to 48 hours an opportunity to follow your own advice and I took it here followed my own advice so this is on my personal Gmail or Gemini account this is Google's uh AI tool I asked it what is mental math and I was looking at my daughter's um you know workbook and and the online resources and envision to make sure that things matched up that it wasn't giving me some different information about mental math than than uh that was in the book then I'm scrolling down I'm like use Mental Math to answer this question I gave it this specific question about the speed the differing speeds between Venus and Mars so it gave me some some information and it gave me some time also to I'm not going to lie I was like trying to calm her down a little bit and be like hey honey it's going to be fine like don't worry don't get frustrated we're going to help you look let's read the problem again right and then you know H how can I help my fourth grader do this problem without giving her the answer and just like in the other one step by step and You by the time I got to step like 2.5 she goes oh okay I got it I got it let me let me let me try can I just try yeah please go ahead she she finishes the problem and I have my notes there and like oh thanks so much Dad I'm like yeah of course they no problem I I got this we're good right and um you know she went to bed happier uh got the problem correct and remembered all the stuff we talked about so you think about you know I was really excited about that because you know when we get to the algebra one stuff um you know if Mrs pal is not home I'm I think I'm going to be relying on this one uh pretty pretty big to help out uh in some of those areas uh so dinner ideas um this is perplexity another one of the geni tools so I gave it a prompt about these are the things I have in my fridge uh can I make you know how what can I make for dinner three recipes one of the cool things about this tool is it gives you the sources right across the top so that's one of the great things about perplexity that the quick sourcing you can also get the sources from co-pilot uh and also get sources from Gemini but you have to click you know sometimes you have to click an extra button or ask to present them perplexity puts it right at the top for just about every search uh that you do you also don't have to create an account with perplexity if you don't want to and it kind of has a feel like feels like a search engine 2.0 um and I'll talk a little bit about the different specific search uh geni Tools in a second um at the bottom it has alternative questions and that one was about are there any vegetarian suggestions for that for those recipes and it provides several of them in the list there so it's uh it's pretty cool pretty cool some of the things that you can do and like I said it's not just about the hard-hitting like mental math or Algebra 1 or you know zeros on homework sometimes it's just like trying to get your dinner cooked and not eat another takeout or something unhealthy and and not I you know I hate throwing away food I just hate throwing away food and uh this can help us with that so gluten-free I I kept going you can get all kinds of suggestions and um you know the biggest mistake people make when they're prompting is that they a lot of times if they don't get the answer they want on the first prompt they stop and they say all right well this thing doesn't work I always say well when you Google something if you don't get the right answer you either keep clicking to different pages or you refine your search right I was looking for you know I typed in Chipotle and it gave me the closest Chipotle restaurant it's like well what were you looking for I was looking for a chipotle chicken recipe well you got to tell it that you got to be a little you got to refine your search it's the same idea uh with with geni tools if you don't get the answer you're looking for or you don't get a good response refine that prompt try again ask the question a different way and the last one uh is work rated tasks you know depending on what kind of work uh that you do if you're in in meetings a lot you know sometimes uh I write my notes out I have like a legal pad I'll jot notes down sometimes I'll type the notes it depends if I've been staring at a screen all day sometimes I like to give myself break uh other times it's just easier and efficient I can kind of go back and check my notes so if you have um you know if you have a bunch of work meeting notes or you know maybe you're you know we recently are working on some Renovations on our home and jot a lot of notes down from from different things um you know or when you're trying to organize you know with kids sports and activities and and um different obligations they have you take a lot of notes you can take a picture of written notes and Tool like Gemini will will refine them and organize them digitally for you or if you have your notes written in like a word doc or something or a Google doc you can copy paste them into a tool like Gemini and then ask it take my meeting notes the quarter two management meeting I was pretending I was you know a financial executive in this and have it organize those notes so it took all those like rough notes of just paragraph and it bullet pointed them and organized them very neatly and nicely and this is Google Go's Gemini tool then we when the next meeting was and then with Google Gemini you can do the the copy option or if uh it's linked to um your Gmail account you can export it right into Google Docs in your Google Drive which is pretty cool so and you can ask it to refine it in different ways I asked it to organize it a couple different ways and it has all that information there which is really cool so I say all that to say and I'm oh good like right at the Midway Point excellent one of the big things I talk a lot with the staff about and my colleagues and we're talking starting to talk with the students about this too think of gen as a thought partner and think of gen as a work partner there's a lot of grunt work and a lot of you know things like the emails and all that stuff that we do that a lot of us do as part of our jobs that um and part of our work and part of our communication with the sports teams and the activities and you know religious obligations and other things and organizations that we're part of and sometimes um with those things you know I think that the Genai has a really great practical use to help us with a lot of the different work that we're doing I think that when we're trying to solve problems this is that's the one that sometimes throws people off a little bit starting to think of this as a thought partner but you know we all have people in our lives if we're lucky that we can pick up the phone and call or we can email and we can say you know try or you know sit down like here at work you know I have a bunch of people Miss's here is one of my best thought Partners I have uh that works in District here and we'll sit down and we'll kick around ideas and we say you know I'm really I had this idea what do you think well did you think about this have we thought about that all right let's let's go back let's see what the data tells us right and we talk out problems one of the nice things about gen is you can do the same thing with Gen and it will give you ideas it'll give you suggestions based on all the vast knowledge and information it has access to and what I found is whether I'm looking at survey data whether I'm looking at um taking you know um you know parent surveys or discussions I've had and um you know punching that information in when I get the the the information crunched by geni tells me what are the common themes in a survey what are the outlier opinions all that stuff then I can go back to someone like miss Shay and I can say you know it's really interesting what uh what the AI Bop said about this or that like you know got me thinking what are you what are your thoughts on this like does this make sense to you and it a lot of times it will enrich our conversations far more then you know and it'll get us to a place where maybe we would have gotten but it gets us there in half the time right and time is the most precious valuable asset we have and when we're talking about working in a school district the faster we can get to solutions for problems uh you know the better it is for the kids for the for the students for for the staff for our administrative team right and we can move on to other things and and start organizing planning and all that stuff so I think that that's something that maybe is a little uncomfortable for some folks initially but when you jump on on board and you and you try it out with a couple of different things you're trying to work through I think once once again similar to the mustard situation you start to say all right this is there's something to this it's pretty cool I think it's important not to forget the human element and to use that information to then enrich your relationships and your work uh situation and your analysis of data and planning to use it in that situation and not to forget that piece of it right so let's talk about some of the tools that we've been talking with students about and with teachers about at the secondary level um and if anyone has any questions we'll for the folks that are here definitely we'll have time for anyone's questions for anyone that's on the live stream we don't have a chat feature in the live stream but please reach out uh on email um or um you can take a look at the website some contact information and resources are there and you can always follow up with me after so all the tools up here with the exception of meta AI we haven't talked about Meta Meta AI with with students and with teachers as far as use in school I put meta AI on this list with all of you and with the folks at home because I think it's actually if you haven't tried an AI tool yet that's probably going to be the first one that you're going to use and um so I I gets important to include that as we talk about that with the community and with parents so right now in our schools co-pilot and Gemini co-pilot is Microsoft's uh AI tool and Gemini is is Google's AI tool those those are the two approved tools for use by staff in our district the tool that's approved for student use for students 13 and up 7th grade through 12th grade is co-pilot when you're logged in on your EB account you can use both of those tools safely there's extra safeguards and firewalls in place um when you're logged in on your Gmail account or an Outlook account that's personal anything you type into the chatbot gets put back into the large language model and can be used to strengthen um or enhance the chat bot's ability to Think Through problems and learn when you use it when you use those two tools with the ebet account or you know your workplace if your workplace subscribes to Microsoft Enterprise account or a Google Enterprise account what they do is they create a firewall around that information so that it's protected from going into the large language model so for our purposes here both of those tools are what we talk about using and when it comes to kids co-pilot is the one that we talk about Microsoft has assured us that they have put the right safeguards in place so that for users 13 and up that it could be ca compliant and CA is one of the federal regulations that we have protecting Children online privacy uh Google is not quite there yet with regards to uh Copa compliance but they are there at the point where they say you know employees of school districts or private company or you know public company Enterprise accounts where that information can be protected uh I think Google is not that far behind from doing that but until they give us their assurances we're going to play it safe and we're going to make sure that we you know protecting student data St data that's that's our first priority before we look at any edte tool um you know I have we have some teachers who are requesting tools we have a process for that and that's one of the first questions before we even like you know yes of course we care about how cool a tool is and how great it is for learning but if it doesn't follow those regulations and it doesn't protect data then we we got to look at something else because that's what's what's important so Gemini and co-pilot right if you're logged in your EET account that's that's our those are our top to two go-tos however there are other tools out there the other tools up here like I said with the exception of meta AI Claude perplexity um chat gbt there's another one for teachers that we talk about called Magic School which has some really great capabilities um but those are the ones that are approved for pilot use so you can create an account with a personal email and you can use those to do the you know do the prompting and and find some great tools and everyone has a favorite uh who's been using this and those who haven't found a favorite have found Google's Gemini and Microsoft's co-pilot to be really really strong tools um you know for for my work you know what I what I do is I kind of have a tab open with all of them I'm one of those people that has like more tabs open in their browser than they show I see a couple people nodding you you hear me on that one and when when the browser starts to slow down I'm like I maybe I don't need that uh tab open anymore but uh I'll ask the same question of two or three different tools and sometimes it's like well they all gave a pretty good answer I get to pick which one I like um but these are the tools that are approved for uh use and for or for pilot use you know what what meta AI is doing is really cool um if you have a Facebook account or an Instagram account that search bar at the top if you haven't noticed this yet next time you go on you're going like oh that herb guide now I see it um you'll see the The Meta symbol and whether you're searching for like an old friend on Facebook or if you're asking a question that's about um like a current event that's going on or or the you know who's winning the Mets and Phillies game or what have you it's not going to what it will do is it will generate a response for you the same way that those other geni tools will and that's a pretty cool pretty cool feature to have so um these are some suggestions there you know if you have a Gmail account you can access Gemini you you have a Gemini account if you have the Google app on your phone you have Gemini already you don't need to download a new app um even when you Google something you're not signed in sometimes Gemini will autogenerate a response depending on what the topic is um to perplexity you don't need to create an account so that's another one that people sometimes start with you can go to it just like Google um each of these programs have paid versions and obviously with the paid versions there's different features and you might have seen with the Claude example it told you told me I only had four searches left so those are some of the things that sometimes that they'll Throttle Down certain usage um elements of it um you know Claude and chbt you have to create an account to use it some people don't want to create accounts chat gbt will ask you for your cell phone number for multiactor authentication if you're not comfortable doing that then you know once again you have perplexity and you have some other options there but I would encourage everyone on the live stream and folks here um you know take the leap pick one start playing around if you've played with one or two of these and you haven't heard of the others try one of the other ones out see what you like about it see what you don't like about it and try some of those things that we talked about um using uh to help your kids or or help uh you with different issues or you know problem solving and things of that nature all right let's get into a little bit of uh the meat and potatoes of of what we're doing with guidelines and the AIU scale and some things I'm really excited about so last year one of the first things when I when I uh when I took the job and I was um you know I'm very thankful for uh you know for Dr f Dr Bly our assistant superintendent of academics and the board of education for creating this position and supporting the educational technology department and when I was uh lucky enough to be given the honor to have the job uh one of the things I told Dr bully was I don't want to just make decisions in isolation I don't want to be like you know there's there's a lot more that we need to learn about this and we need to bring the team together need to bring our our we have really bright smart teachers you know specialists media specialist you know we have a lot of talent in this district and I think that it's important that we bring people together and we talk about what we're excited about what we're a little bit afraid of and how we can work together to make the right decisions and do what's best for kids and for for teachers so what we did was we formed AI working groups and there was an AI working group for the K to four level uh at least one representative from all eight of the K4 elementary schools we had a team here at Hughes that was made up of someone at least one person from each department and across grade levels we had a team at Churchill same idea different subject areas grade levels and at the high school we did the same thing and what I did was I tried to meet with them four to five times over the course of the year we also had canvas courses and Google classrooms where we would communicate uh on occasion share articles do some work kind of uh on through those platforms um and work efficiently that way um and that would enrich the work when we were able to get together and what we did through that work was that work and those discussions the real work that was done in those those sessions allowed us to plan out this overview of what we were going to do for this year so what you see here is a direct result you know I don't want to it's not just me it's it's a team effort here in East Bruns we work together we get our smart people you know and by the way on these teams it wasn't just people who were like total AI like you know uh Believers we we I said look I want people who are skeptical I want people who have questions I want people who are skeptical and have questions but are interested in finding Solutions and are going to bring and we're going to help us strengthen our policies and our guidelines going forward and I think we did a really great job and we're continuing that work into this year so we're here to tonight to talk about the um the secondar so you know you'll see in the elementaries mostly teacher facing awareness literacy all things that we're going to do at and we are doing at at the secondary level as well the difference with the secondary level is that the kids are exposed to this they already know about it they have accounts they're supposed to ask for parents permission before they sign up for chbt Claude or any of these other things I'm sure all of your children here did that and asked your permission before they created those accounts um according to the terms of service they're supposed to but um you know maybe not everybody did so we said we have to be a little bit more um you know aggressive about our Ro and put some rules in place and put some guidelines in place so that it's not a free-for-all and we're learning how to use these things properly it's not going anywhere the you know some of the early research is showing showing that students who are using these tools and learning how to use them effectively are getting edges in college searches and in the job world so and the kids that aren't that some of those achievement gaps are going to you know continue to grow and we don't want that we want every one of our children regardless of of of what their learning needs are where they're at academically we want them all to have all the tools that they need to succeed so at the secondary level we worked on something called an AIU skill uh this this um research has been going on for about a year it's been a really strong um community and a really strong part of the AI Community talking about how to to generate the rules and how do we have a scale so I'm going to show you that in a couple seconds but that's something that we worked on in the working groups instituted this year and are really proud of we updated our guidance we had guidance documents to start last year that I think were pretty good but we took the work of the working groups we took student feedback surveys I went to principal's council at the high school multiple times had conversations with the student leaders this year we sent out uh surveys to for students to join the nextg AI uh teams to continue those conversations they're going to be hearing from me in the next week or two if any if any of your children are interested on the live stream or uh that are here in person tell them to go on to the AI Center website the form is up there we're accepting any kind of feedback um ideas and also interest in joining the next geni team good thing to put on the college transcript also uh so we're going to have a Churchill team and a high school team and the other thing that we're looking at this year we started to have some conversations about this uh last year um but we're going to really kick this into second gear this year is talking about the idea of a student digital code of conduct that's not just talking about AI but talking about the kind of digital and physical Community we want kids to to to live in and to learn in and it's not just about AI but it's about you know some of the you know we I'm talking about a lot of positive things that come with AI but we know that it's not all positive with any Tech advancement there's there's some drawbacks misinformation some of the deep fakes uh there have been some news stories about students who've you use some of these tools inappropriately and really embarrass some of their classmates and you know at one of the principal's Council we talked a little bit about this and you know so like we we need to identify what kind of community we want to live in and we want to learn in you know how we treat each other we talk about this all the time in the physical classroom but the digital space our kids live in the digital space as well so the idea with that is let's talk about what we want that to look like let's give kids a seat at the table we're here because of the kids and sometimes I feel like they don't feel like that they have a real seat at the table and I told them last year and continue to tell them this year you know as long as I'm in this job you have a seat at this table because this is about you what's best for you we want to do this together so these are the some of the things that we're really excited about with regards to the secondary first thing we talk about a little bit is the guidance these documents are on the AI Center website um there's a student guidance and and staff guidance um there's guidance documents for students and staff at Hughes and there's a staff guidance document for our K4 teachers as well once again tonight we're focusing on the secondary so I these are zoomed in I didn't want to try to make everyone read the small print on the other slide there um so you can see at the top there it starts with kind of a statement of you know you know what we what we believe about geni you know we believe it can be a force for good that it can enhance learning but we also know that there needs to be some core principles and yeah we're not going to ban AI but here's here's the road map a little bit about what we believe so um for for staff we talk about specific things like using the IU scale that we're going to have clear identifiers of when AI is appropriate to use and when it we're going to ask students not to use it and that scale is going to be really important um we have academic Integrity statements the University of Penn put together a really great website for their professors um to you know kind of different models and ideas for them to put in in their syllabus documents for their courses and that's been one of the things that I've heard had a lot of teachers say you know those were really good statements I I modified a you know I was like you could even use AI to modify some of those statements a little bit uh but make it make it sound like your voice what do you believe about in your class what's the class culture that you're that you're looking for um and a lot of teachers have said that those were really helpful so trying to give teachers the resources they need I'm not trying to micromanage what they're doing we're not trying to tell them this is exactly what it needs to look like but the biggest piece of feedback last year from staff and students was that both groups wanted to wanted clearer rules and clearer um identifiers of where the guard rails were so the guidance e see here for staff is a direct result of of that feedback both verbal we did a lot of qualitative you know research and and and discussions I talked with a lot of people K12 we did surveys and it was really uh interesting to see the similarity between the staff and the students and what they were asking for here you can see some additional tools how to it the use of AI MLA and APA citations you see um we use turnit in.com which has an AI detection tool now one of the things I've been telling the teachers and I'm being transparent is that um you know experts in these tools so turn it in.com there's another uh company called copy leaks which is kind of a turn it in competitor and at an AI Summit that I was at at a at a high school in North Jersey uh the representative from copy leak said we have maybe another year and a half to two years where AI detection tools work and then after that it's going to be hard for those detection tools to work because there will be so much AI generated content out there on the internet and it will be hard for those tools to differentiate and identify so what that says to me is number one I think we should use the tool right now I think that that's appropriate and a good idea but it also reinforces for me the cultural discussion about academic integrity and the importance of you know setting the rules and the guidelines like that's an important piece of this too because we're not going to always be able to catch everybody using these tools either so and maybe that will change maybe we'll get different information but I I think that that's a that's a good um a good assumption to continue to make uh there's staff resources equity and communication you know one of the big draw like one of the big um you know I think criticisms of AI is that it does at times exhibit some bias it does have some Equity issues at times sometimes it can be really uh Forward Thinking and Progressive when it comes to those things other times you know depending on how the prompt is is worded who some of the developers are behind some of the prompts you know that's one of those areas that we have to be careful so important guidance for for staff and students about that has been critical just to make sure that you know if you're using an image generator or if you're asking a question you know depending on how you ask a prompt it might skew the response if it's about if it's political it might lean more to the left or the right and and you may have to check the source information so that you know where you're getting the information from just like when you read news sites you have to understand where you're getting the information from um so you know you may ask it to generate an image um of your classroom and you may get the image and it may not look like your classroom so you have to be a little bit more specific sometimes if you want to get it to do that and there's other times where I've seen image generators do a great job without needing a lot of prompting just like people these tools are imperfect so we have to educate we have to make sure that people are aware of that planning assessment differentiation support all important stuff um the guidance for teacher or for students rather so this is not just about AI this is about edtech as well I didn't want to make this as you know all about Ai and and you know anything scary about you know that I wanted to talk about it in the context of all all technology so and we do it in a Q&A format you know talking about ethical use and appropriate use of various tools and then you'll see some of the similarities well you know are students allowed to use edtech and AI tools for school assignments it depends right talk to your teacher here's the AIU scale here's more details about using AI tools that that that redirects to resources that are on the AI Center web page that are specific for students uh the citation guide you know a lot of simp communication for both the staff and the students because the idea is to is to really like make sure that they understand what the expectation and they can talk about it together and be honest about it and not try to pretend that this thing isn't happening and that these tools don't exist right um remember these points before using a and you know the last piece there when in doubt be honest talk to your teachers it's really really important one of the big things with these guidance documents right is to make sure that we're having the the conversations we're talking about these things I think that that's really really important and so far you know look look it's hard to bat a thousand on any of these things but I feel like we've set up the structures that have allowed for those things to happen and you know we're going to get better in a lot of those areas but I feel like that these have really set some good uh foundational principles and being that it's the second year second full year that we've had with Guidance the First full year with um with our AIU scale I think we're really excited about the progress that we're making and and I think that getting more voices involved having parents uh come out watch on the live stream having students on those next geni teams continuing the AI working groups with the staff I think is going to be really critical and important for us to continuing to to continue to take those next steps so as I said before we have uh the Hughes guidance and the K4 guidance uh I've would encourage you to take a look at those and kind of see how we're building up to the secondary um but we'll save a lot of that for the uh Elementary parent University next week so this is the AIU scale that I was talking about before there's a researcher um out of Australia Leon Furs who um started posting about this on LinkedIn about just under a year ago and kind of started this Global conversation with other folks in edtech or or in positions like mine uh supervisors or directors of of edtech around around the country and um his original draft of this had a five here system and one of the things I brought it to there was the Church Hill AI working group in probably March or April of of last year so they're the first group that I had a chance to sit down with as I was diving more into this research and I um I said to them like what what do you what do you all think of this this is pretty neat and they're like oh yeah this is pretty cool said well let's take a look at this and let's work for the next I don't know 30 minutes and let's see if we can start the beginnings of like a rough draft of what do you think this should look like for Church Hill like what are some points or what are some values that would be really helpful as a Church Hill teacher and you know we have math we have science we have history we have health we have practical Arts we have everybody here represented let's um you know we got music we have we have art let's let's try to do something that you know it's not just the math department or the social department but something that will work for everybody and they put together rough draft notes and I said okay I'm going to the high school in a week or two for their working group I'm going to share not to them and we're going to kind of do a combo effort on the Google Doc on this and they were really excited High School group opened it up I said all right here's what the Church Hill team did so far what do you what do you all think like what do what do we think same diverse group of folks together put together some of their notes kind of drafted some alternative versions um and between those two groups they they were like you know a five tier seems like a lot like maybe can we do it in four all right let's give it a shot and and we played around with different configurations we even tried a three tier ultimately all the notes that we gathered together uh the team and it made me feel pretty good A lot of the team uh members and the working groups basically said all right herb like we trust you to kind of take all our notes distill it down like you know put together a a second draft or close to final draft and um if we get to meet again at the end of the year we'll take a look we'll make notes email it out to us and we'll before we leave for the end of the year give you some time to talk with some other experts and see what you think about this and um this is kind of what we landed on and um and I'm really proud of it I think it encompasses all the different scenarios everything from the fact that we wanted to make it clear to students that maybe using AI is not always a good idea and there's going to be times that your teachers ask you not to use it and they're going to do that because they have a good reason there sometimes is an important it's important for you to just think and the struggle is the thought struggle is part of that's part of the learning experience and that's okay we don't want you to struggle so much that you disengage from the work but we want you to struggle because there's that's a point that's a that is a part of the learning process right all the way to AI powered where we say okay make sure you cite it but you could use these AI tools as long as you site the use and you do it properly in certain cases we're going to say go go all the way to level three and then the level levels one and two are good for kind of a stop Gap that there's a there's a point where you can say you can use it up to this point you can use it to outline for your outline you can use it to generate ideas but everything after that we want you to use your brains we want you to use the strategy we talked about in class um I actually very excited we just got a grant approv by the uh uh East Brunswick Education Foundation uh for uh 350 of these us scale magnets that are going to go in every classroom at Churchill and the high school so there it's a uh 19 by 15 magnet and uh and then the the stoplight over there which by the way I'm going to disclose here that was AI generated uh I used AI as it to create an image of a bear holding a stoplight because there was a couple schools I believe in North Carolina who used the stoplight and I was like that'd be pretty cool we could get a bear the bear pictures that like got cropped out where the scale is now were a little silly and goofy and you know uh were funny but not helpful for this so I but I like that the Paw was around at the bottom and and some people have said why blue at the bottom like I toyed around with the idea of a a green turn signal like with the arrow and you I said you know a couple of schools I saw had like a blue light a blue Infinity kind of underneath the red the yellow and the green light and I was like well I don't know if Infinity is really where we we I don't think we're there yet I don't know if that's that's really East Brunswick at this point with our thoughts on AI but I like the idea of like a blue light like and I joked say I always joke with people and you know some have heard me say like I'd love to have a jetpack it would be easier for me to you know travel to the all the all the 11 of the schools and the admin building for meetings and evaluations if I had a jetpack it might be easier to get around with traffic so maybe someday when we all have jetpacks the blue light will be like okay jetpacks you can go or uh or something like that or flying cars like and Back to the Future so um you know we had a little fun with it we're having fun with the with with the present we're having fun with the future uh so this this is something that's I'm really excited about those are on order now and I'm hope to be up in all the classrooms uh soon and there's going to be a uh the EB bareface they measured it out so that it fits in the stop lights so the teacher can put the bareface on whichever level is appropriate for that assignment class so we're really excited to to provide those tools for teachers and for students all right we're running we're uh I think I'm right at 8:00 or just about so uh and I want to leave time for for questions so a couple things I want to leave you with here right embrace the challenges but and also Embrace those opportunities uh I hope that everybody uh on the live stream and the folks who were able to join us in person uh come away feeling a little bit more confident about using some geni tools and um you know come out with some more questions too and and and you know thinking through the process and ways that you feel empowered to help your kids and and help yourself with the various different challenges that you have going on it's hard like you know adulting is tough as they say um but it can be a lot of fun and I think that um you know with these AI tools there's some opportunities to help us with the numerous things we have to do so embrace the challenges and opportunities talk to your kids I think that Honesty you know being transparent about about AI is important about the appropriate use of AI the same way that we should be talking about social media uh about respecting each other themselves their classmates their teachers I think that that's a really important piece of this is you know being honest asking them questions um and and making you know making sure that they know that you know about this stuff now I think is really really important um you know trust but verify I was a history guy before I was a technology person and uh President Reagan used to say trust but verify talking about the Cold War I think it's an appropriate phrase when we're talking about AI talked about hallucinations a little bit before about how AI isn't is not infallible so you have to you know trust the results but verify them make sure that you're getting accurate information equity and representation talked about that as well these are things that are important to be aware of um if you get a result that doesn't hit you the right way I think that's important to kind of investigate that and make sure that you know your kids are aware of that and that's something that we talk with teachers a lot about as well um before they just copy and paste and use it in any kind of uh you know assignment or if students are going to copy paste and use it as you know uh that that why that's not a good idea one of the reasons is because of equity representation and um and misinformation as well you know uh make sure that the content speaks with your voice I talked about that with the emails you know that's a really critical piece you still want your voice and your ideas to come through I talk with the students about that a lot um that's a really critical piece use these tools but make sure that it's still you that people are hearing right um be careful when you share any personally identifiable information I talk about this a lot with the staff that um if we use this for different purposes responding to emails to make sure you take anybody's name out um you know if if you're using gemini or co-pilot with your ebet account there are some built-in protections and scrubbing of information and things but even on those tools I've told people we take out any information um any personally identifiable information you don't need to share that you can just put I put like you can put like uh t for Teacher you know um C for child or s for student whatever and that way we're not sharing a lot of our information's out there you know there's been big hacks and things you you get some of us have gotten six text messages asking you to verify a package that was delivered to your house and you shouldn't click on it uh you know if it's Amazon or something go to Amazon's website um you know or those phone calls you get and you're like yeah sure here's my social security number right you don't want to you don't want to do those things so personal identifiable information it's already out there too much of it don't give away any more of the store right and you know privacy settings are important children under the 13 should not create any accounts on these things um and anyone you know who I think that if if you are going to allow your child to do that you should be aware of those things and have the conversation about that similar to if you don't want them on social media talk with them honestly about it if you don't want them creating accounts on this talk with them honestly or if you're going to let them set some of your own guidelines use our guidelines as a start but maybe set your own guidelines as well with your kids so anyone who's watching on the live stream and for the folks that are here I have a feedback survey U I want to thank everyone first of all thank you for coming out I know like I said I know this is a busy time of year every time of year is a busy time of year but um you know I I really do appreciate you joining on the live stream or if you're watching this on demand afterwards appreciate you taking the time to watch this um you know you could be watching playoff baseball or football or something so I appreciate you taking the time to watch this and I really appreciate the folks who were able to make it out if you could take a few minutes to fill out the feedback survey um it's a few questions and mainly just asking for people to share any additional questions that you have um and sometimes it's like you know I should have asked that while he was there you know sometimes on the ride home when you're not thinking or something's play on the radio that's when those good questions come so um you can go back on I will put the link to this survey on the AI Center website or if you want to capture the QR code there um you can feel free to leave me any feedback um or you can email me afterward um you know and uh I think that it's you know it's really important I'm really proud of the work we've been doing it's been getting recognized in the region and I think that's a a real Testament to the hard work of the teachers the staff our administrative team you we have a really smart team at all levels here in East Brunswick support from uh our awesome board and our great central office team um and we're really proud of that but we're here for kids and we're here to serve the community so um if there's anything that you have questions about or anything we can do uh you know we're here for you and I want you to reach out to me and my office anytime thank you so much for the folks at home thank you for the folks here have a great night and for the folks that are here we'll stick around if anyone has any questions and uh have a great night everyone thank [Applause] you e e