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everybody got quiet must be time to start are we on ready to go like to call this meeting to order and we'll begin with the Pledge of Allegiance and uh I'll lead the pledge I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all this is amazing we have more people here right now than we've had at a board meeting in a year it seems like really ex yeah this is exciting so we only have one item on the agenda and it's the uh to um approve the hire of Mr Jonathan rolloff for the position of superintendent as of July 1st 2025 so any discussion no discussion we would like I just want to say one thing after done all right we are so excited well yeah we're really excited for you to be here this community is a community of people that are passionate and they love the community they love the school they're really supportive and grateful for anything wonderful that happens and so you come into a big family um that will know everything about you you and support you um even if they don't agree um very headstrong um Cowboys and Pioneers so it's just a fun and wonderful place to be we're glad you're here Chuck um I'd just like to welcome Jonathan and also I'd like to note the fact that he's already wearing the school colors it was the tie originally Jonathan we'd like you to just take the podium there for a minute and introduce yourself turn around and introduce yourself to these folks here and tell them anything you'd like to tell him and and um I was going to say good morning but it's it's noon so president Merill members of the board Dr Wright public I'm just really excited to be here um you know the energy since I came up for the interviews and have spent a lot of time in the Pinetop Lakeside area has always been a very positive energy and I'm just excited for you know what the district the potential of this District what Dr Wright has started and what I believe we can continue in growing the greatness of the district my kids did get me these shoes for um my birthday so that they said you know I need to be cool a little bit and uh I guess I'm not cool anymore I think I used to be cool at one point in time but uh but yeah my kids got me the shoes and I'm all about the energy and I'm all about the school spirit and uh I'm excited for this community and I'm I'm excited to be part of this community love the weather they said it's not like this every day but you know uh I'm I'm glad you guys ordered up this beautiful weather day but you know I'm I'm excited I think um there's lots of opportunities for academic greatness to be continued and just to support the students of this community because our kids are our number one resource and so investing in our kids and doing amazing things academically and I would um I would be remiss if I didn't mention athletically um in Blue Ridge that uh I think we have great things yet to come in our community and so I'm just excited to be part of that so thank you all for well I guess you still have to vote but thank you all for coming here today and uh hopefully voting me in and um I know I start July 1st but I plan to be up here A whole bunch between now and then and uh work work with everybody and being an Arizona native myself I know when people think of Chandler they think of it as a thriving Metropolis now but you know when I was in school um you know some of my classmates were you know lassoing traffic signs and and so Cowboys and Pioneers are not um a new story to me and I'm just excited to be here and I think it's going to be a great partnership for years to come and my plan to be here for the long run and to really help this District continue its greatness onto the next generation of uh Yellow Jackets go jackets were there any questions the Bor had for me questions I think we're good thank you so the next item we need to discuss is a motion to accept the recommendation of Mr Jonathan r offer the position of superintendent starting July 1st 2025 a motion from Jennifer a second from Chuck all in favor that's unanimous we'd like to excuse Margaret today is out of town and uh Diana Butler but we're represented Corum so Jonathan looks like you're you're the man now and we have just a couple of little items we'd like to give you here this is you know you come up here and you run e huh I don't oh yeah yeah yeah I think it's probably smart they're here [Music] yeah Michael's right there Jen it's weird looking outside in isn't it all right this is a little atypical for a board meeting too but I'd like the people that are here just to kind of stand and just say who you are and and uh what you do in the community I know you're you're not going to remember hardly anybody anything but I I would appreciate if we just start right here with yep you yeah got to introduce yourself we'll just do this and then we'll come to the back and we'll come up this way just take a second these guys over at the table too you didn't hide by sitting over there and you guys in the back back that are standing you didn't hide either yep there you go e e e now do it all again so I can hear I'm I'm just kidding I'm just messing with you so uh welcome we're excited you have no idea how excited the board is to be working with you in the future uh I know the new board members that start in in January are just as excited as we are they had opportunity to to interview and to give a recommendation and I think that all recommendations pointed your direction so with nothing else uh Dr R did you have anything to say just welcome to the BR family we're going to if you want all want hang around you're welcome to do so and introduce yourself to Jonathan and Welcome to our family Jonathan thank you I do believe that a regular board meeting December 10th if it's possible that you could come up and stay maybe with your wife for a day or two uh after that board meeting we're going to invite the community to come into a a meet and greet so they they can shake your hand get to know you a little bit better and you get to know them a little bit better so uh welcome we're glad to have you here so next item is a I need a motion to adjourn have a motion from Chuck a second from Jennifer all in favor of adjournment that's unanimous thank you this meeting's over
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e e e Board of Education meeting thank you for joining us uh in accordance with the open public meetings Act njsa 10 through uh 4-6 adequate notification of this meeting has been provided by advertising in the record please stand for flag salute I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all please pause for a moment of silence thank you I would also add and ask that uh anybody however you pray whoever you pray to that you send prayers to Mr Derek's wife as she is going through a current uh medical situation and also uh Dr Tom CO's uh father-in-law we thank you for your prayers uh tenis please pres pres Mr pres Mr Sanchez here Mr K pres mramos president all right motion to approve board minutes so moved call please second August September I approve uh October I abstained that was approval of August and September yes and abent on October I was medical same as well I'll obain October and then it improves August and September I was in here in October y Mr M approved Mr Pino i m Sanchez hi Mr Taylor hi Mr R hi okay superintendent report please yes sir thank you Mr President welcome everyone thank you uh for coming this evening we have uh incredible things happening in this District it really is a great place um uh I try to get around as much as I can but it's very difficult we're trying to move forward uh this board has been incredible uh we just had committee meetings again um the amount of work that uh that these individuals are doing throughout the month is is very impressive and I'm not saying that because I I have to I'm saying because I need to because you know I think one of the things as serving leadership whether you're here in the board on the council in the assembly wherever it is uh we impress upon these these students um here and this District to do the same like to get back to pay forward to your Comm Community Etc uh so so I really appreciate there's some uh really great programs coming on um coming up um in the district so we're going to um be able to talk about some of those during my 100 day entry plan uh meeting that we'll be having probably after the holidays I know was a little rough um during December so maybe we do it after the reort uh we need to talk about a strategic plan uh moving forward I had the privilege of of helping this community do that several years ago I'm looking forward to updating that now uh with this tremendous staff and all the stakeholders so we're looking forward to that um we're excited some of the new technology that's going in here at the high school we have some kiosks um that our to be utilizing uh for um for cafeteria I want to thank the board operations commit for for uh for giving us C okay on that uh you know again I I've impressed upon the board and I I really appreciate their support uh and I want to be the first distri to do things not the last District I want to be that Cutting Edge District here so that these Representatives up here sitting at today with me who represent all do when we go places everybody comes to us and say hey what's Garf that's what we want to be so these kiosks are a way not only to to get our students more time for some of that relaxation during food and you know food safety Etc it's important as well but it's you know it's everywhere you go you don't to dunp your Don it's a kiosk it's just the way the world now on the app so so this is a way to modernize it and I appreciate the board uh supporting this uh I think it's going to be again Cutting Edge and something that all these other districts are going to be visiting us for so I believe Mr I believe that's going to go live if it hasn't already today or tomorrow so for those high school students that are here you know go and uh let's uh let's flood it so we can see uh you know see uh what we need to do to get out some of the Kings because obviously we know when we do something new right we may have to take a step back and make sure it's done correctly so uh but you can't be a person that's going to worry about all those things right we want to we want to take these chances we want to we want to make sure that we strive for excellence so that's just of the things that we're doing uh also very happy to report our Roc program which we partner with bille uh it's not easy to get your own RC program uh you know there certain mileage uh Etc um but I wanted to partner uh with that District because I did help that District put together uh our the importance of meet um with our veterans our veteran population just not only in this community but uh all across the country is uh is very great I think it's import that our students understand whether they serve or not uh giving up your your livelihood and your your some of your freedoms to just to help others maintain their freedom is an important thing to understand so um so this RC program we have several students in it now and I think they're really excited so I I can't wait to have them come and drill here one day maybe um say the Pledge of Allegiance with us and the colors would be incredible I know Mr ke is getting involved with the with the groups around town um to to kind of work with these students uh to try to expand this program my my ideas in the next two years to to make this program grow exponentially so we can hold it here um we're also talking with veterans uh again with the uh some stuff we're going to try to do the veteran honor chair chair of Honor uh which we talked about uh a few months ago uh so work on that with the architect um and and those other things so a lot of great things happening I want to thank uh again my transition I just want to thank every that's been so helpful the administration bar the board of course uh really uh again uh very very impressed with your commitment um to this place uh it really is second for on so and I I've been all around the state um doing different things and uh there's great things happening here which brings me to everyone here tonight to to honor um you know another part of the curriculum right co-curriculum it's like that for a reason right Athletics Club it's also a major part of the academic life of any student all right not everyone can be an athlete um not everyone wants to play sport they can join a club and all those other things so tonight we honor we're going to honor those athletes who Excel here for us uh and who did an incredible job so we'll get to that in a minute but first I want to call Mr Mo um to talk about the soon in the month or or [Music] thank you good evening everyone I had the pleasure of teaching our November student of the month calculus during her junior year and since then I've come to know her as a truly dedicated and outstanding student she's consist consistently demonstrate a remarkable level of academic achievement her intellectual curios her commitment to her studies are evident in her membership in the National Honor Society in her outstanding grades and in her recognition as an AP scholar having excelled in AP biology AP Calculus and AP History in our Calculus class she was particularly diligent often meeting with me outside of class time in order to work on challenging Concepts her willingness to engage with higher order thinking right even when her peers hesitated is something that always impressed me maybe the one of the things that impressed me the most about her time in my class was her exceptional calculus notebook the level of detail the annotations and her notes were so comprehensive that they could have served as my own lecture notes the academics she's also demonstrated leadership and dedication in extracurricular she serves as a captain of both the in track field teams which she leads and inspires peers she's done extensive volunteer work which includes organizing events with a Polish Culture Club assisting with fundraisings at the Garfield public library and teaching Catechism classes at St Joseph's Catholic Church she's also a talented dancer dedicates approximately 5 hours every week for the past 5 years to study Latin and ballom dancers her passion for her polish Heritage is evident through her studies at the St Stanis CA polish School culture and language and on top of all that she works parttime at the Venetian as a waitress showcasing an incredible work EIC and amazing time management skills as we look ahead I'm confident that she will excel in her future academic professional Endeavors at this time she's applying college and she plans to study both biology and nutrition in short her work ethic her resilience her intellectual curiosity or leadership make for an ideal recipient let me read the the uh presentation here the Garfield Community of Barfield High School proudly recognizes Alexander sori as the November steud of the month presented on his 25th day of November anded by our principal m uh thank you so much for the word I'd like to thank Mr St for nominating me on this award and I would love to thank my teachers and parents for really um pushing me in my academics and my coaches for pushing me through all that I can in mys ex thank you I don't know I say m torski real quick first uh let's give a a round of applause to her parents I'm sorry I was so delayed I was taken back by all the things that you make possible when we all make excuses I'd like to present you with this from the board um real quickly um I would like to acknowledge Mr garto former board president Mr K Kain uh Miss Tanner Raymond our new council members so I'd like to give them a hand a round of applause uh Mr Delaney is somewhere back there there he is congratulations as well you look like one of the students you hide well all right uh continue yes thank you congratulations to everybody thank you everyone uh okay uh we also now to call our uh Student Government um representative oh we have a team of people and we have a good afternoon everyone uh today I would like to present you two members good evening everyone my name is and I'm the histor of I'm really excited to share a bit about one of four incoming up events in Cloud Fair which will be held this Wednesday in the school [Music] uh inspired with the lot of information that the students did at the beginning of school year I came up with this idea during one of our summer meetings I myself struggled with with this when I came to Garfield so I'm excited to see how the students will benefit from it at the fair we will have tables sh up set up to Showcase all of our clubs Sports and academic programs but we're not stoping here thinking about the future we are also to hold another club here over the summer this time for incoming a graders this way they will they will be able to start high school with a fter picture of how they can get involved with this event we hope to motivate more students to get involved in their Community School I'm really excited to see how it all comes together and this will impact uh how this will impact students thank you so much I'm the treas of student government and I'm to announce uh our codra which we we have partnered up with NHS to uh put Chi p and um as we also plan to collaborate with school organizations keep to keep gr our community and um the way this project will work is that we will collect coach for the month of December and our current job applications are uh the G the public library in the prop recreation center and um the we we will be giving out the the cach during the month of January in the beginning of January and we strongly encourage you to do make any generally used quotes that you have because we believe that um because we believe that what you can your oldest more thank you very proud of US Government throughout efforts I'm very uh grateful to ad for for all of her hard work and believing in us and allowing to us to um you know do those events right and yeah thank you very thank you all of you for listening [Music] there a whole store full of unused coats thank you of applause okay uh Mr Mo I don't know if the sports awards or coach all right let's go moment we waiting for tonight again very proud of go all of our students do the academic side curricular co-curricular very important we want to celebrate all the achiev that's what the board's new um you know uh Mantra is so uh so that's why we're here tonight thank you Dr PCO um personally i' like to thank all our coaches all their hard work time dedication um I really do appreciate it I I know I don't say it enough but I really do appreciate everything that you guys do um and it's the first time we're doing this year so thank you you know we normally do that our the Year banquet but you know pleasure to do it here in front of everybody so first of all Call of girl soccer cool Jackie ol second [Music] our next spt coach boys across country first I have for honorable mention Aaron Gils and then I have first te Jak [Music] jacobowski um what event was that coach De Carlo girls cross country honorable mention Isabelle con fori honorable mention Juliana Ramirez she's here second Team all we Kasha Kula and First Team all league and third Team all Bergen County Julia junior Julia [Music] tell you guys AR broken girls volleyball CO's not here but assistant Galler is second team leave Alysa rry second Team all Le ailia Reesa first team Le Mariana Patino and first team of leag emal all right next I call up girls tennis coach Fe before coach Fe on his old League ID like to give him his certificate for Coach of the Year [Music] we have an award for honorable mention all leave Patricia of cona and for First Team all leag Nicole balita football uher coach back here second team [Music] Le second team old League no [Music] our mention will be JJ Alaska Le Huber w [Music] need a spot like this for himself first team of the lead Xavier [Applause] s and first team Ro lead Anthony molas right this time I like to call boy soccer and Coach Salah alongo coach Fe coal was Nam coach of the year for the njic colonial this year W also got in January as a state coach of the year for as well hen the T second SE Le [Music] Oscar second team will Le Josh Martinez second two christiany first [Music] Jacob I think get taller by the kid Sebastian the Seeker first team on Le Martin chovin first team Le Andrei first team on lead Christian Ramirez first team will Le juli Miss [Applause] Mesa and first team of the lead l Gonzalez my boy soccer this year won the elite title we went 10 and0 in our division for the second year in a row we made it to the county final which is the first time we made a county final and advanced to the second round of the state tournament so with that we have certificates for all League I'm going to call you guys back up again Brian Fernandez [Applause] jacobowski ju [Applause] mzi Christian [Applause] resesi J [Applause] helin [Applause] salana Julius Lisa Christian marz Josh [Applause] [Music] Martinez and Campos sash [Applause] Oscar Andrei Mar [Applause] tropy Sano Ana Rodriguez the manager Cole [Applause] b as Al Le Gonzalez [Applause] [Music] all right so what we're going to do now is since the year ended a little abruptly last year we're going to give out all our awards for our new champions for girl soccer girl strap my apologies my apologies good evening uh I'd just like to thank a few people um thank you to our amazing coaching staff coach Mula Coach Brown coach dorms coach piri we had a few uh a volunteer coach rgz coach George who helped us in a wait room coach bigs uh the athletic department administration Board of Education District administration uh Mar High School administration all our nurses medical staff bus drivers custodians and our Borderland maker parents and families we wouldn't be able to do what we do without all of your support and guidance so thank you all the 2024 girls outdoor track and field team returned most of our talented six and3 team from the 2023 season and made it a preseason goal to make some noise in the nji SE this team did more than that they went 8 and0 to win the league title for the first time since 2012 the team improved tremendously across the board with just one senior scoring for us at the league championship meet and we expect to be back again next year this is all incredible considering this was our the first year of training on our beautiful new facility our training has been taken to a new level and it's night and day compared to what we used to deal with we can't thank the administration enough for getting this project completed on behalf of our entire team thank you again for all the support and all the recognition gr try next year will be girls soccer in the full Isabella Bor the seniors from last year obviously aren't here but is here so Isabelle conform me coo Kasha Kula magdalina Len [Applause] Salis Alexandra sori Sophia C Angelica kamaha Henry Victoria oh Julia jansa t k n [Music] Moses Jackie OTA Ariana [Music] Caso Alexandra [Music] perz Donna Williams [Music] Mariah r [Music] n and car next our Le chance for Spring [Music] Track right this time I go coach KH with boys [Music] volleyball we have DIN and dessert Dr Tom Mr to starts talking they're going to be here a [Music] while all right good evening everyone first of all I'd like to thank um everyone that was a part of this including board event our Administration our athletic department um like we said the nurses medical staff our trainer everybody that was a part of it and especially the great Community um of Garfield that was with us the whole way coming into this season it was our fourth season together and my fourth year as a head coach this group was special because in my first year the seniors that were part of this group were a freshman so they kind of helped me grow throughout the sport as they grew in the sport and we kind of had this journey together knowing that from freshman year to senior year we were working toward something special coming in the senior year we were returning our entire starting lineup and we were excited coming into the year knowing that we had one goal and that was state championship 2024 season we finished off at 27 and 4 with a lead record of 16 and0 playing an njic title for the first time in school history we go on tournament where we would upset a very dominant Burgen field team making it to the semifinals of the county tournament but unfortunately it wasn't our time to L counties as a year went on we follow on going into the state sections as the number one C team in North uh North one group two where we ended up winning a state sectional title for the first time also we did so much short but again nothing but proud of all these individuals who worked hard for four years to accomplish all the goals they want to um I'm going to go through the Rost right now and I'm going to call out our [Music] names guys just want to call you up you're going to come up here do what you do and just stand right across over there cuz we are going to call you back up for other things first off oh our leag Champions and all right at time over J Caso [Applause] J [Music] Manel Roger [Applause] Chavez [Music] ra for K Jacob fishski Jake [Applause] de Casper [Applause] Gavin [Applause] bis [Music] [Applause] Mario unfortunately there are some who could not be with us tonight um our great managers Emily Andrea and Maya Che guys I'm talk on the days oh we got one right here all right beautiful and uh last but not least who could not be here with us tonight um Elon Tapper who is currently at a National Tournament in Indiana playing [Applause] volleyball okay I would like to mention though with our um our Awards although we didn't mention it last year we had first team all League Omar alali we don't have any wars you got them last year um Jadwin farington just give a little wave Roger Chavez and Elon Tapper second team uel Jacobi and I will mention John far First Team all County haacker and second Team all County Roger [Applause] chares and now for your sexual Championship Awards other [Applause] John Caso [Applause] Fon [Music] [Applause] [Music] J Roger trz [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] for Ty [Applause] jski eler J [Applause] Isaac radoo who is also not here [Applause] gavis [Applause] Mar and our managers Maya Mitchell Andrea Ry and Emily toal we're going to take one big picture with everyone but I'd also like to recognize one of our own on the team who just finished basic training for our Marines johnan Caso awes over here Coach B [Applause] [Music] they should get in back of us they should get in back baby one 2 [Music] he's one of them that was amazing I don't know juice who's going to be long round appuse [Music] all progress thank you e [Applause] [Music] we're just going to give everybody a few minutes to clear out those that are on stand [Music] good job good job you know all right Dr TOMCO if you'd like to continue yes thank you again uh progress just want to pass back to you appreciate all the support again uh all the new programs looking very forward to women's lacrosse as well coming up so uh started something good so thank you very much U Miss [Music] D good evening I just want to go over a few things in regard to the facilities projects that are currently underway or will be starting um each month I will be about what the district is doing how we moving the district forward what the needs are right now districtwide I was very excited um November 15th we took possession of our second uh 54 passenger bus so right now between October and right now uh November we have three buses a 29 passenger and 254 their park at high school so it's very exciting for us for safety uh in our bu high school now we are having approved on this meeting uh to have the intercom system in the building uh upgrated the cafeteria circum lines are getting all of their Finishing Touches at the middle school and high school and then we had our architect look at the draining issue the drainage issues in the shop areas U of the high school Al the upda you as more forward with that project uh lastly but very important as well School number n the boys and girls uh bathroom modeling is scheduled to start I have Happy Thanksgiving to everyone this week appreciate it thank you Mr uh committee reports are there any committee meetings feel think I think Miss I think M covered it I we're working on school number nine with the bathrooms also uh some uh most of the cameras are put in the m at the gym at the uh at the attic field so we're almost done with uh for security purposes we added more cameras there so that's a that's a blessing as we continue to slowly but Surly get things done operational wise um that'll be all for operations and uh operations any other committee reports Mr Taylor uh the governance committee had a meeting we went over eliminating a bunch of old policies that just were out of date or not in compliance uh going over first readings and second read readings which some of that is part of tonight's agenda and trying to move forward with newer policies to update things to make the district a little bit more streamlined as a lot of the older stuff was kind of past its due date okay all right that's it all right uh motion to go into Personnel 6.1 through 6.21 I make a motion motion by Mr Moo second by Mr Sanchez all right any questions or concerns not roll call yes I Mr M i Mr Cino i m Sanchez hi Mr CH I Mr r i okay motion to go into Finance 8.1 through 8.15 so moved motion Mr folino motion by Mr folino second by Mr Malo vo call Mr K i i Mr I Mr abstain 8.1 8.2 8.4 I on the rest Sanchez hi Mr tayor hi Mr hi okay motion to go into Ed education 10.1 through 10.16 moot motion M second second Miss Sanchez local oh any questions or comments not local hi hi Sanchez hi K abstain 10.6 number 28 I to the Mr I okay motion are going to facilities 12.1 any questions motion motion by Mr Taylor second second by Mr Mal Mr hi hi Mr M hi mrina hi mche hi Mr K abstain 12.1 number two I to the rest mramos I okay motion to go in into Athletics 14.1 I'll make a motion all right motion Mr people war or Dr people war and seconded by Mr Taylor I I Mr hi Mr Cino hi Mr Sanchez hi Mr tayor hi Mr hi okay motion to go into policies 16.1 through 16.4 so moved second motion by Mr folino uh I heard Mr Taylor first second Mr Taylor any questions he roll call Mr I I Mr I mrin abstain Mr Sanchez hi mray hi mramos hi okay um at this time I'd like to open up the floor for public comment uh briefly I believe in the beginning of your packets there is a you want to read it yeah I believe it's in the beginning sure yeah [Music] on the front page of every packet or agenda that was listed there is a a a statement which I will read again um hopefully this will be the last meeting that I do and in fact read it um however in accordance with the Garfield Board of Education policy 167 the Board of Education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest to permit the fair and orderly expression of such comment and pursuant the New Jersey open public meetings act the board has set aside a portion of every board meeting for the public comment on any school or School District issue that a member of the public feels may be of concern to the residents of the school district members of the public wishing to make public comment must be recognized by the presiding officer and must preface comments by an an announcement of his or her name Municipality of resident or group affiliation if applicable each statement including more than one topic made by a participant will be limited to 5 minutes duration and no participant may speak more than once please be further advised that the following guidelines shall apply as this is a public forum public comments may not in any way be disrespectful vulgar or threatening toward any member of the Board District faculty Administration or staff if any public comments violate these guidelines the speaker will be asked as to refrain from offering any further public comment regardless of whether they have time remaining in addition the speaker may be interrupted and his her privilege to comment terminated if the speaker's comments are disruptive or otherwise violate guidelines on behalf of the members of the Garfield Board of Education and Garfield Central Administration thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter um whoever like to go first Marina is a 67 okay um your policy sorry3 you of the high school Feld came about in August 2024 the last meeting you Mr tono said that it wasn't your responsibility for the food poisoning with Steve Burgers because you said it wasn't the leas with the boys and girls club there is no 7s in existence and Steve Burgers was at the high school complex four other times for the boiler makers football games none of which he had permits for is anyone Tru being held responsible for this as a the assistant her assistant mil people under them are they going receive any rubber bed or is this or will they be receiving another race this year um their policy states that food trucks and their employees need to be approved 30 days prior and have fingerprints done I'm assuming none of this was done as we would have known that they should not have stepped foot on the school property if the person responsible was doing their job correctly um I actually have a question from Mr Kirk um during an election can the Board of Education compa and the city council compa cingle their funds as in paying for or mailing for each other's [Music] Flyers this for you um last summer in was fired a guidance Council from school 4 stating that there was no one no need for one although I believe she was fired because of people she was friendly with I ever and please explain to me why in 2 months you realize that you need this guidance counselor and yet the position was not even up for an interview for the previous counselor who has applied why are you abolishing the citizens advisory committee policy 9140 I assumed that this was the committee that you supported Danielle and Kathy and starting are people in the commune not allowed to have any involvement in the schools at all also is this why you were revising policy 014 as you cannot change the terms I am assuming you'll be cutting down the members from to seven or five with the board members um leaving only members on the board that do not question anything being done there was so many people running for the Board of Ed this election which shows that people care how about you add term limits to the board of ed so that we can see some changes um the Wi-Fi with the schools the every student succeeds act requires for the kids to have sufficient internet if that if that is what their curriculum requires it's public law 114-95 it's identifi and address technology Readiness needs including the types of Technology infrastructure and access available to the students served by the local educational agency including computer devices access to school libraries internet connectivity if you cannot provide the schools with sufficient Wi-Fi you have to provide them with textbooks or something because our kids need to learn and that's all that's all for [Applause] you at the end I I barely heard you yeah let them address now generally we should wait till the all the public comments done then everybody will we just want to make sure that everybody gets addressed because then there's a complaint that nobody got address so yes huh talk talk I yeah we wanted to we wanted to address her concerns first as a general policy the public speaks and board members and the administration could respond accordingly to whichever they feel necessary so whoever's next in the public I I would advise them to go next answer again yes are you going to remember back on my memory never got any of my things answered here before T Raymond 93 Spring Street um I would just like to read into record I see the bush group's not here tonight thank goodness uh but I would like to read into the record from January to August their cost to the city to the board was $71,400 that was a period of 7 months uh I will be requesting to the end of the year now I would like to just talk about Oprah requests I had put in an Oprah request and I see the bush group uh charged uh for my op request to review it $216 uh Alysa isan put in an Oprah request to review hers it was $162 now during this last campaign this SM mailing went out and I think you all saw it completely disparaging a family which is really unacceptable acceptable this turned off so many people it wasn't even funny but on this flyer it says all this information was obtained through an Oprah request I would like to know who requested this through Oprah I noticed their name was never mentioned publicly like mine and alysa's are we being singled out because we did O requests somebody OED this information and I want to know hope that should be public information if my information was public this should be public and I do hope I don't know I think the council's going to kind of address this when they get started but this kind of literature should not be part of any campaign whether it be the board or the council let's talk issues we didn't agree with the presid council that was in and we discussed issues but we did not attack anybody's family or anybody personally and that's the way it should be and you know I was really very surprised that you let them I know you probably didn't compose this but when your name is on it they should have asked you for your okay before this went out this was terrible and it really turned a lot of people off um and I would really like an answer I want to know who requested that o that Oprah request uh and I guess Mr TOMCO if if you don't know off the top of your head you really should maybe conduct an investigation because this had to come from your office this kind of information should have to come from somewhere in the board office and I mean we have an idea where it came from but we'd like to know um specifically and and then I received this letter from Mrs dirch after I put an opener request in August 19th at the meeting which I won't do anymore I'll be doing it online and I heard September 20th which by law you only have seven days and I didn't report this um but I will the next time I didn't get an answer and in the letter it said that Kurt gisler gave the okay to um to to give the answer I didn't get answers to all my questions now you talk to the bush group they have to look at it then you go to Cara where's it going next to Supreme Court it's an open request I mean it's public information I'm a taxpayer my family owns two houses in this town and a business so I have a right to know where our money's going um I would like an answer to that please I understand there was a new position created uh another one maintenance supervisor I would like to know what the salary is for that why we need a maintenance super don't we have a supervisor of well he I I thought he was a facility supervisor and an assistant so like why do we need another one and what's the salary was it advertised and how many people applied for it um let me just see here the new sports complex I would like to know who decided who was on the committee to decide that name for the new sports complex the former board had passed a resolution that that was supposed to be the Frank Boston complex and this board I don't know if all of you were on the board when it was rescinded but it was rescinded I want to know who was on the committee to rename that complex uh it had to be part of the group here I'm not quite to know who who it was this that's that's time that's time is up yes well you said 5 minutes for one topic I have a different topic it's 5 minutes total it could be separate topics it could be separate topics yes during the five minutes but you're limited to 5 minutes quick this analyst position I'd like to know where where this analyst this analyst position is going and what we're paying for that business analyst thank you [Applause] hi everyone Aon delini 226 Market Street I will be very brief um being that we're on the topic of one of the mailers that did go out I just want to say I know that this information of your employes and their salaries is public information and can be obtained through Oprah but for a sitting board member to exploit their employees for their own personal and political game gain is appalling I think that this individual should issue a formal apology to those employees and um aside from that that's all I have to say and Mr giser it's very hard to hear you so that statement the 5 minutes earlier in the meeting I didn't catch any of it so if you can use the microphone I think it would talk it's in the front of every package is there anybody else that would like to speak Kevin Kane 13 L good place in darkfield um I want to piggy back up what morea said I've been speaking to a couple of the teachers at a bunch of the different schools and they've all come to the same con senses that the Wi-Fi is absolutely horrible um not only can they not teach properly but they're actually having students use their phones in the classroom to make up for the lack of the Wi-Fi so when something is detrimental like that it's included in the curriculum I think that needs to be addressed immediately to make sure that it's done properly and also when you're doing virtual teaching a lot of it's getting cut in and out and they're not able to learn properly in the classrooms so I think that needs to be addressed good evening uh before I get started i' first like to congratulate your name I said before I get started J Street Mar before I get started I'd like to congratulate uh November stent of the month Alandra sski very very impressive young lady I you hear any little but I don't know how anyone has time to do what she does but it's very very impressive I also like to congratulate all the uh athletes that received honors uh this evening again you should be very proud of yourself and the coaches uh Mr Khan I've always uh spoke very highly you and your coaching abilities and uh the young men that came up today show a lot of Cl going up to the board memb shaking hand so I want to commend you because I know you had something to do with that all right uh my first question I I know the board uh this we spoke about this several months ago um about the students from the high school there were supposed to be two students being like Representatives representatives of the high school in reference of Board of Ed why hasn't this been done actually this was spoken about probably 6 seven months ago to be honest can uh you please pick some students and and get because I think it's beneficial to you you people to because you're going to get a lot of feedback what's going on that you may not know what's going on um also I want to just go over this little flyer I know um Mrs D spoke about a couple of things that are going on here but have uh this flyer that went out in the uh spring I think it was um has any of the boilers been replaced yet cuz on this flyer there's five boilers that needed to be replaced has anything happened to just refrain from commenting to um and you know the literature here and I know who put this together believe me I know it says $1 million in summer Capital uh summer Capital maintenance projects the five boilers alone about 1.2 million so I don't know where the other money is coming from um like I said uh this this Derek spoke about bathrooms I believe at what school 9 start being repur um why hasn't any of this been done I mean is any of this on this flyer which back in the time when they called it it was nothing it was a campaign fly put out by one of the people uh that works in your office Mr T um I just want to know what what has uh been done besides the two things that M spoke about that going to start I mean you put out something like this 6 s months ago there should be a little more progress than uh than what was reported today um also I'd like to congratulate the uh the individuals that won the board election mros MRIs Mr Taylor and the gentleman that gotas I'd like to congratulate all these I just pray that you guys you know do the right everything for the district for the children moving forward and uh you know again I encourage all parents and students who start coming to these meetings again when I was on the board I always used to say I used to put out there on social media come to this me hold us accountable hold us accountable for our actions give us ACC when do you know when uh when earned and also hold us for our lack of Aces and that's what we should all do with all this for and keep it canel to thank you all right is there anyone else that would like to speak Hi I'm the new with the 27 War rep uh I want to know if there's any projected date on the Wi-Fi improvements um Mr Ramos stated that the online curriculum was chosen to more accessible to students however it's not accessible if the Wi-Fi is insufficient um many students in classrooms don't have textbooks so they are relying on uh internet programs and computers uh kindergarten students do not have computers or necessary books for their curriculum they can't even test them on their reading uh is this also a problem for new students in other grades and I want to know when and what you plan to do about it because it seems like adequate Wi-Fi and devices would have been a priority before moving more is there anyone else joose lady the thir also L's neighbor so weever her address is going first of all I like to uh say what a pleasure it was tonight to see that boy you honor the athletic teams I had a pleasure of seeing the uh soccer team play in the bur County tournament and it was a great game they lost but they played a great game and if all of you know whenever any team makes the bur County tournament that's a tremendous feat itself me we have Team such as D hos St J all the top high school teams in the state and the country and there we are competing as is with the volleyball and I follow you on Facebook always follow you so it was very proud moment to see to see that game and to see tonight that your honor that you honor them but I'm not I'm not here for that I'm glad I seen it but I'm I'm here for really congratulations all the on Board ucation election but it was the election that I'm here to speak about I sat on for many years I had many elections and never once as a city Boardman did I use that position to put down a certain family and M Raymond didn't hold you accountable but I'm holding you accountable your face was on that fly right you put employees of the school board names and salaries on that fly just so you can win an election know you can change the outside of you but it's it's side that really matters the outside would mean nothing as far as I'm concerned you know and you can say oh maybe it was a handers who did it or whatever but when you take B employees from this district and use them as cors especially a person who's not even related and you bring that name and that salary into an election just do you have any type of code of conduct of our Board of Education trustees I I know the city council does does the Board of Education have any sort of conduct that the Board of Education members have to appoint if you don't I feel you should you know once I left the board of I never once got involved in Board of Education legs but I feel maybe not going to have to because what I see going on know it really app me that you can SC out [Applause] all right is there anybody else okay Dr con if you'd like to address anything absolutely through the chair thank you very much it's good to see the count the new city council or to be city council here I look forward to working with all of you because I have a lot of great ideas we go work together so you being here tonight show we're going to be able to have that dialogue so and the town manager as well thank you very much than good seeing you Mr lady um so yeah I so just just so we're all aware of certain certain things obviously we can't talk about it's Personnel issues ETC but um when I'm I I will try to answer as much as I can to the chair uh but if if there's something I do miss contact me after and I'll get you those answers and you can always come up next to me and you know regurgitate what was said but let's talk about the Wi-Fi first because I think that's the the biggest problem that I have as well and the board is very aware of this we actually spoke about it several times in committee um we spoke about it as well tonight which is and issue because some of it is security for it as well um you had from what I can what I can gather and this is going to be part of my 100 banry plan um um you know report or or presentation but what I can gather U you had a major issue with with called a pipe which is the uh the dissemination of uh information coming out of the buildings so you all an incredible job several years ago taking care of that um that was one concern that wasn't upgraded years ago uh it's no no board members issue it's an administrative issue um and that was taken care of the problem is it's sort of like getting a new heart with old vessels I was call the board before old arteries and stuff um the infrastructure here is has not been updated correctly for a very long time um probably 10 to 12 years um and I think what's been happening with budget concerns budget constraint Etc has has kind of um you know push some of those switches and fireballs and other things aside again I'm not in in the business of blaming people prior um I'm the business moving forward all of you that come up here and other people have concerns I know concerns with all this uh so we do have a plan uh of action we've already created um a patch for the active directory so students can log on easier now logging on um we're doing some other things uh actually this week actually over the Thanksgiving weekend uh with some other things the Wi-Fi tries get us a little bit more speed and internally with some of the switches this is a major cost for the infrastructure so been sitting down we have some ideas for the board um and some uh some other funding areas so so that will be addressed but again um you know being completely transparent um it is what it is now some of the curricular things that everyone's talking about that are online um I think these are things that we've had already maybe maybe since I'm here now we're using a little more frequently over the last few months but uh but again it is a concern we've had some audits done uh with regards this so we're we're on track of it it's not it's not an answer who wants to hear uh but I think in anything that I'm finding with this board support which has been incredible so far we're moving forward we have a plan of action there's a couple of other things um with some Union situations and other things that we also need plans of action for uh that you'll see so so again uh that's all I can really say about the Wi-Fi is that we're moving forward on it uh there's no quick fix on it but we're going as quickly as possible we do have some virtual learning uh going on which hopefully we can resolve sooner than later those are our priority areas uh but I think the main thing is that we are on top of it again I have a daily meeting with our team our outside team that's working on this on the inside so it's just sort of being as that so I don't know if that really answers or what's what you wanted to hear but it's transparent enough to be the plan of action moving forward um so that's that uh that covers few different questions but let's try to go back to some of these things um first and I know Mr G is probably look at me but let's be very careful with things that we say here live those things um again I'm not questioning anybody specifically you can say what you want your adults here but you know when we talk about you know food poisoning and stuff like that I have no I have no recol or no nobody told me that someone specifically food poison so let's just be careful me say that uh not on our relist on people you're saying that about on food agency please be very careful that was public comment uh so in saying that I want to be very clear this board is not saying that anyone has food poys that we're aware of so we're not liable for any of that stuff but that's a that's a personal issue do want to say that out loud um and then saying that again uh yes I call it a lease whatever you want to call it use facilities form but anyone who uses facilities here has to go through a process I'm learning all these processes been here in 4 months some of these processes here are Antiquated doesn't mean that they're not effic uh that they're not lawful that I just don't think some of the things we're doing is efficient our workflow systems have um some PS in it and we're working on it there's a lot of different things again not saying anything was wrong but I think I could I could help this District be more efficient so we're working on um so everyone here has some kind of approval or Lee facility I call lease per se um and that does not um that does not rectify the fact that part of that uh apparently uh in the town or the township there is a requirement for food uh food trucks or or anyone to get a uh health inspection I don't know if the the the town does it talking to some of these food vendors nobody's ever heard of this before so if this is a new thing we're doing or it's just not followed up in the town um so again something that now was on there uh you spoke about the athletic field um policy uh that policy was kind of in limbo for a while we were rewriting it because of some of the issues in that policy um and you know uh I think that we did get um some permission from um from the individual policy commit at the time to utilize from truck because um we allowed to use concessions so the policy was contradictory of each other that's why you see the second room tonight I appreciate the board um finally you know kind of majority the board at least going through both readings on that so if you look at that policy you see it's kind of clearer now I think um you know the original policy when I got here we weren't allowed to have grills we weren't allowed to do anything really except basically sell pizza so that was a concern it's a concern for fundraising Etc that's why we had in food truck uh again not an excuse so not excuse but moving forward um it is what it it is what it is uh with regard to that um in saying in saying that as well um these policies that you see here the board again not a board issue or previous board member issue it's it was administrative issue um and again not to blame any administrators before me but it's just a reality uh we didn't have any regulations posted here boards have policies which are broad strokes and then they have regulations which are more specific to the polic so for example you may have a you may have a dressable policy that says you have to wear this this and this and the regulation is you know you have to wear purple you have to wear right so so none of the policies were posted until I think it was last month I think we posted those finally asked for giv you permission to post those when we finally posted those there were a lot of regulations that had options left blank they were never updated for a long time that's why for the next few meetings you're going to see a plethora of first and second readings so when you mention something like the board member there's no change there there's a there's a blank the regulation right now that was approved in 2006 maybe don't quote me on that says there are blank board members so we're just filling in the blank so we look more efficient is the word uh and the blank would be filled in with a nine that's what the first reading is so there none of those changes that are happening no nothing no funny stuff happening like that just really putting in compliance um and this board's very aware of that been very transparent with posy commit we sat for a very long time we had a separate meeting with the posy committee the go over all of these um that brings you to advisory committee uh some of those abolished committees that you see there uh those are abolished by the law so back in the day every board had to have a advisor committee whatever it was called that doesn't exist anymore has nothing to do with the new HSA committee parent has nothing to do with that that's not by policy that's by uh their own fruition so that b policy uh I think was 04 Z I think is nothing to do with that just be very very clear with that uh as well um uh I want to explain a whole ochre thing in a minute but let me just go through some of the other stuff if I can get the timelines and everything Wi-Fi student reps uh was that were brought up inary school board about that I spoke with Mr Mo about that um there's two ways that the board can select reps to be part of their board are called board members now student board members um there could be an election which I don't think we want to do we don't have I think it comes um I hate to say popularity contest but in high schools intends to do that or you allow the current SGA or sgo to choose its member so with the reorganization we're speaking uh I was speaking too about this with the reorganization come up in January we going to see that a little bit I think we're we're working out some of the Kinks and that so so that is something that's happening um already for the student reps um the projects that are happening or the projects that were put in in said plier that was brought up before um as anyone's aware uh I think what was happening during the summer when I got here those those projects were approved some of those projects were via Grant a recreation Grant I believe it was I don't if it was a shared Grant whatever it was but um all those projects now most of those projects especially the boilers and that is correct that is a that is a almost right on accurate price with the boilers um they are with the architect right now um there's a there's a process that we have to follow so we're on board F we do have operational boilers we be nervous but we need they need to be repaired there's money allotted for that but again I think all these things everybody's bringing up for concerns really brings you back to the fact that even though we're out of the woods we have all of these things happen you have an infrastructure repair for technology that I've heard about since I've been here that's very expensive you have six five to six boilers that have to be replaced which is very expensive so all these things are going to impact this budget season so we all have to remember this so the way we're talking about it now because I think it's important to do that uh as we progress forward on all the stuff um there's other those other projects with the um uh inside of gymnasiums stuff that AC exp we're talking about today quotes on prices and she's doing an excellent job job trying to get the the cheapest I don't the cheapest is the word the most cost effective price so uh I'm a little more like I I want to go a little quicker but you know she's she's doing her sharp defensive so so I appreciate that um to talk about the um the naming of the facilities I make the only person I can really answer that is here the board one of the board members isn't here tonight Mr derck so maybe we can talk to him about it if you all know who he is in sure um he's the one who introduce me to that when I first got here so there's a big plaque in my office that has it on there I really don't know the I don't know the uh the history of that but he actually physically brought me the pl and had Mr Moo's name spelled on it so that's why it's not out there yet um we're talking about that too we're talking about some of the stuff that we want to do to recognize some of that and I and I've actively reached out um to the family and we're we're going to make it right I think this board supports that so so in December we'll have an announcement for that uh to kind of again move forward because that's g i new all degree should be recognized um you know he's he's a pillar of this community I knew him like I said before uh and I you know he affected me as an individual and I and I wasn't uh my my youth wasn't here so um so that's the only that's the only person that could really answer that question um there's a there uh Mr brought a code of conduct I don't know if there's a quote of cond for board members I don't think but there is an Ethics um ethics there's ethics I sit on the ethics commission obviously most people in the living um so there's a Code of Ethics they have they have to follow I mean I can give a copy of that if if you'd like and can send you that but I don't know about a quote of conduct I never really actually heard that um but again I'm sure the council probably has something like that um the analyst position was something that the board approved I think two meetings ago or three meetings ago she's doing an incredible job uh she's basically doing all the stuff that you know was Consolidated because that entire office is new it's minus time it was minus I think two or three people uh the analyst position is picking up stuff uh we moved some people over to HR because HR Director left so so the entire Board office is brand new really um and everyone's doing an incredible job I want to thank everybody out loud for that um there is no new M uh supervisor maintenance position what you saw tonight is just a um an update of the job description you're going to see that potentially from time to time as we're you know hiring people are going to update the job descriptions those are out of um not compliance but they're they have to be updated as well it's a whole other area um we're working on a bunch of stuff position controls uh there's a lot of things administr here that uh just have to be tightened up a little bit again nothing with the board previous board it really was an administrative thing um so we're doing a little bit at of time here oh that is yeah that's yeah thank you that um that position is in the in the contract as well 560 contract and it was posted um so that would be uh that's something that we're going to continue to do um and I think the last thing is just talk about the overs um so for for lack of just kind of talking about what everyone's saying here with the elections and whatnot um the elections are a very tedious time and you know unfortunately local local elections especially in a town like ority like AR where they're every 4 years and you you only have an election every four years for municipality and whatnot um this is a tough tough year I guess right um but that that neither here nor there I think um you know regardless of what a flyer says doesn't mean that anything actually happened I mean I could be honest with that I don't know what you're talking about but I I understand what could possibly be in the Oprah um the opras now for each starting with this year are are posted um but again you know a lot of this like uh you know is public record um all you really have you don't even have to op go back to the old um you know agendas but regardless of that um the whole idea of Oprah you know the whole idea of Oprah is is not to weaponize process that is here to assess assist people and that's something that I I know people do it I'm not saying any he is doing that but um I'm trying to avoid that here because it does take a lot of time and everything that has to do with Personnel or any type of name or involvement or contract or whatever it is has to go through an attorney that's just the way it goes there's no reason because of a public record to jeopardize the board because something's not redacted the right way that's how it should be and for any administrator municipal or board to think that they're going to just hand over an open request that is not easy as just a contract or what not within 7 days is is just not smart it's not because what you do with that is by by by me through the board secretary handing in a piece of paper for an o that no one's looked at puts everyone in jeopard so that's where the costs align and it's not norfield and it's not Bergen County or Ence County or Mercer County it's anywhere and you know again if you ask for a contract in 7 days it's easy you download a contract and you give it out but if you ask for certain things that are time and or Time bar with regard to specific questions or IDE you know again the this is what takes some time and that's where the request that's where the Oprah becomes weaponized because that's exactly what it is um you know you're trying to get answers and that's how it op's about it's trying to get just information just so everyone is clear all you're getting is a created document documents are not created for a request if the document exists then then it appears so when you ask for when you ask for something that he created that's what has to go through the legal process and I need attorney to tell you that so um the time the timeline piece the timel is you know try to get to everyone as soon as possible but again it's it's difficult sometimes especially during during the budget season um and and again if you look at some the reason why I like posting the Oprah on here and I I actually I actually encourage the council to do the same um but the reason why I like putting it on here is because it's forget about the people in town that ask for stuff cuz those are easy things but there's other there's other agencies that Oprah every District hours and hours of work for for research that you never see anywhere um some of these things have to have to be curtailed because it's taking up um you know some time so and I think you can ctail that by education by educating people on what you're actually going to get um so in saying that whatever whatever people are saying was over or not I have I have no clue um what it is I guess you can Oprah the Oprah I guess I don't know if that makes any sense but that'll go to Mr Ker's office so uh I I think I answer everything I possibly could if I'm missing anything something email me and I'll get them the answer tomorrow I'll share it with the board so but thank you okay um at this time I'd like to open up the mic to uh board member comments if anybody on the board would like to make a comment uh now is your time Mr President thank you uh first of all I want to acknowledge the student of the month as well as the athletic teams their uh contribution to the schools and the community is well recognized and we appreciate that uh also want to thank the veterans that was a couple weeks ago Veterans Day and also wish everybody a Happy Thanksgiving thank you mras I I would also like to congratulate the student of the month Alexandra like mentioned by Mr garto what an amazing job I mean it's incredible I'm sorry it's incredible her accomplishments and I I as a board member and as the board here we congratulate her for much success um calculus is very difficult class to take uh it's not easy I want to thank the student government for the participation in this club fa that they having this Cod Drive I would also like to uh congratulate the Athletics for their participation in all these program they did outstanding the soccer the volleyball cross country to the coaches you guys are amazing continue to to shine to continue to inspire these young kids uh athletic is not for everyone but for those who are good continue doing it um I would like to also uh thank strangers helping strangers they they doing a Cod dve for autism and MD centri for students with autism and multiple disabilities for the holidays and also I would like to uh I believe there's a play going on the frosen J Jr and I want to congratulate the high school for that uh thank you for your time M Taylor Mr M uh like most of the other board members like to congratulate stud of the month everybody that was honored tonight uh thank you to the class representatives that were here the coaches um namely coach D Carlo coach Salah coach feedi coach Khan amazing uh the student athletes they're the ones that went out there and got it done you know the leadership and the coaching obviously plays a huge part in that something I'm familiar with and and I commend coach Khan he and I have a uh a good back and forth on coaching and uh you know I'd like to Pointon at that he won a State title and a sport he can't even coach but heck of a job no State section title for a volleyball coach came up in four years with the same group of kids you know I'm busting your chops that's amazing to learn a sport that you don't really know right to come up with them you had some talent but to motivate them and to get them to where they went that's something that shows the man can coach anything right so give him that coach Salah amazing job I mean we see what he does I will say though and she's not here anymore but I think coach Z Carlo is the best coach in this school ever since I started coaching here so I mean amazing amazing job and Coach feedi with tennis um from what I've learned in in the last three years and I thank the citizens for re-electing myself and and the members of my team co uh doc coach but Dr Tom Co alluded to it that there are issues that aren't just a year old or 3 years old or 6 years old there's some stuff that's festered along the way and maybe cans were kicked down the road and it's now on the board and the current board every year to address those issues and it's not done overnight it's not easily rectified and remedied but coming here speaking up on the issues and us we do know the issues you know where they present themselves but hearing different things and different ideas and different perspectives truly does help us to better fashion the way we can handle things as a board so I keep saying it and Mr garto said it plenty of times come to these meetings we don't just say it to Plate the public come to the meetings and and speak your mind and tell us what you really feel should be done and and we'll do our best to do it I know everybody has certain questions or not everybody but there are certain questions that are asked that can't be answered in this form but I think Dr TOMCO did a great job of answering the ones that weren't exactly Personnel related and trying to give an overview we're not here to blame previous boards previous administrations previous leadership but the fact remains that there were issues along the way and I'm sure there's been issues in the last 3 years and there will be issues going forward it's about limiting those issues it's about trying trying to solve as many problems as possible and have the least amount of issues going forward um I just I thank you all and and it's an honor to be up here I'd like to Echo what my um former TR my trustees also said about the athletes here um you know when Mr TOMCO came here the Mantra that he used as progress well I'm seeing progress in our athletic system I'm seeing progress AC mically here in school I I think it was at the last meeting we awarded 11 students for perfect school on our SATs coach KH here uh he's doing another outstanding job as our some of the other coaches the soccer program I could see the progress and with progress comes pride and I think this is a town that needs that Pride we need to bring that Pride back and the individuals that are there our administrators our teachers and our students are starting to develop that and uh I think it's pivotal for a community to grow in order to have that um I do appreciate that people do come out here and voice their opinion as long as it's something that is going to be beneficial and Enlighten us that's positive and that's progressing and that's the way we'd like to go is to continue to progress and with progress we're going to continue to have PR thank you for listening just really quickly thing no sorry I'm sorry um I know in the beginning of the meeting President Ramos mentioned uh two people to share your prayers or however you you know go about that with yourself but also the uh crossing guard Claudia Derek who you know her speedy recovery as well we need to acknowledge that and congratulations to coach Khan on his engagement y just really quickly I'd like to thank you all for coming uh with your questions and concerns uh I'd like to thank all the athletes and the coaches that came here today incredible work uh and like to thank the student of the month Alexander shoski and uh just wanted to wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving else right I'd like to thank everybody for their participation tonight um a lot of things I I I think it's it's nice that we're starting to uh congratulate our kids and actually make them the center of everything I would like that I would like that as a city we start to celebrate more things um I understand that there's a lot of things that need to be addressed and a lot of things that will be addressed in the future um trying to Build a Better Community and strength in our in our boards and in our councils and all of stuff of this nature I hope that we can move forward in this sense and actually uh work together in order to bring the best out of the city uh I really would like if we would you know we plan on on uh having more uh student involvement we would also like to you know give that give that um that credit to those teachers and administrators and those people that are behind the scenes that do the things that they don't get credit for those those congratulations those thank yous those those little things that that go a long way um I would like to take this time to uh wish everybody a Happy Thanksgiving and hopefully your time spent with your families is well spent um I pray that if anybody is having any you know uh medical issues and stuff of that nature that uh God brings them a speed of recovery that's just through my faith um and I just I just hope that that we can continue to move move forward in this in this season and in this spirit and just you know progressively try to correct the things that need to be corrected and do them without having to bring the negativity towards it I appreciate the community's uh the community members involvement I appreciate the things that are being brought forward I appreciate that things are starting to slightly calm down and we're actually able to address certain issues out the attitudes and and uh aggression um I hope that we can you know get a little better at answering these things because I don't feel that we're answering things all as well as we can be because uh we have to really Overlook that process and actually find a way that's easier to make sure we're addressing everything that we can not everything you know not everything is addressable at the moment but um once again I'd like to thank everybody uh for coming out tonight thank you for bearing with us it was a long meeting with all of the things but they were all good things it was it's it's great to start you know uh congratulating our kids and giv them giving them that Applause and that attention that they need and all the things you know that they're doing well and and they're excelling in you know we we've seen month after month all of these kids that are that are bringing up all these educational standards and just making us seem like we don't do enough in our lives so um I'd like to thank you for your time uh I guess at this time I'd like to one more time sorry so uh through the president um the board is uh going to Mr n is going to help us out have our choir uh for holidays for next month singing here about 6:45 right for the meeting we'll have light Refreshments to uh kind of uh you know send you into the new year so we invite all of you to listen to our choir with some festive songs next next month hopefully see you later well Mr Taylor handing out candy canes all right at this time we'd like to make a at this motion at this time we' like to take a motion to close the meeting so moved all right he made it you got a second all right there we go Motion Mr Gino second by Mr Malo all in favor all right thank you everybody Happy Thanksgiving
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
e e uh welcome everyone to the regular business meeting of the Board of Trustees held here today November 25th 2024 uh thank you for coming this evening everyone could please rise uh Mr babjack will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance and a moment of silence thank you item two on tonight's agenda is our Board of school trustee resolution of accommodation Awards um 2.01 Crossroads Regional Chamber of Commerce 2024 inspiring educator Awards uh I'll be reading those here shortly individually uh but if I can get a motion to approve uh item 2.01 so moved motion by Mr Smith seconded by Mr Vasser all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries 4 z i could please have all our winers come up and get uh in the Limelight here and face the crowd we'll uh make sure you get your just doe here resolution accommodation crowno Board of school trustees honored commend these individuals as exemplary teachers be hereby resolve that the board of school Trustees for the crowno Community School Corporation wishes to express sincere congratulations to these individuals for being named the crossroads Regional Chamber of Commerce 2024 inspiring educator Corporation winner and school winners Board of Trustees publicly recognizes its achievement and renders it permanently to its minutes to be presed for public posterity dat this 25th day of November first of all the overall Corporation School winner Kristen Camp our finalist for Solen Robinson Elementary School Katie Brown Jerry Ross Elementary Christina Bika congratulations Lake Street Elementary Amy Haw bomb just makeing sure notes match so I don't mess this up from Colonel John Wheeler Middle School Al from Winfield Elementary School Pamela Rector from Douglas MacArthur Elementary School Christina S sagita I say that right from Timothy Ball Elementary here time sturis sanss Dwight D Eisen how Elementary School Fiona subtle and from robery ta Middle School Joyce zillis uh ladies I'm on behalf of the board uh administrative team congratulations on a well-deserved honor wish you nothing but continued success oh sorry oh yes for e you will not offend anyone one if you choose to leave at this time thank you and those that accompany you I'm sure greatly appreciate item three in tonight's agenda is our patrons comments there are be there are none tonight so we'll move on item four our consent agenda Dr Terell thank you for your consideration tonight we have 4.01 our regular business meeting minutes 4.02 the appointments to the Crownpoint Library Board of Trustees appoint uh Kyle Jeff to a four-year term beginning January 1st 2025 through December 31st 2028 and reappoint Lauren zerban uh to a four-year term from January 1st 2025 through December 31st 2028 want to thank Julie and uh Kyle for being here with us this evening uh also if your consideration 4.03 the personel agenda as listed and then 4.04 voucher registered checks as listed in your documents as well you've heard the recommendation of the administration uh to approve the consent agenda may I have motion second motion by Mr babjack seconded by Mr basser question or discussion all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries for 4 z uh before we move on to our next agenda item uh Kyle anything you'd like to say now being appointed or board thank you for volunteering your time I'd also like to point out that Kyle is a is Mr kach you may or may not know he is a graduate of the finest educational institution at Midwest L universi and I'm gonna guess just by appearance it's a few years after the two of you just a couple I couldn't help so but again thank you and you are free to free to take out yes thank you lack a better way to say it take off all right item five action I 5.01 approval to apply for and receive Grant funds from the tech Point Foundation robo Grant Mr Harman all right before I do that I want to let Tim that I am graduate had a Comm and Jim Hardman I got my master so go ahead Tim you can say something about Jim received his master's degree from Butler University Jim are you a Browns fan pardon me are you a Browns fan no I not there there's there's room there's room on the bus room for improvement always that's for sure well thank you uh Mr President members of the board I have a a grant uh tonight seeking your approval and this is from the tech uh Techo Foundation robotics Grant um Sarah Colin our stem specialist uh applied for this grant uh and this provides us an opportunity to enhance our curriculum with the stem program at the elementary school by actually bringing in a robotics component to it uh we get the complete uh play area that the children will be uh designing robots with and also programming them to be able to uh to compete against each other in the classroom so more students are having that opportunity uh the cost per school is $2,598 we're seeking your approval tonight for $1,186 uh for these uh robotics competition fields to be to all of our elementary schools for their curriculum I would say on the tech point this is a pretty this this organization is really substantial in the robotics in the stem area uh if you go to their website uh you can watch uh hundreds and thousands of dollars being donated to this organization because every donation pops up on the screen on their website when it happens uh and so it's very much something that people do support are able to offer this uh this Grant and we're happy to to be able to apply for it and receive this money so SE me your approval tonight thank you Mr Hartman uh you've heard the recommendation of the administration to apply for and receive funding from the Techo Foundation robotics grant for the vexo elementary stem robotics classroom bundle valued at 2598 per School totaling amount of $1,186 may have a motion motion second uh motion by Mr Vasser seconded by Mr babjack question or discussion Mr Hardman is this the first year for this grant this is the first year of course this is the first time we've had the stem correct curriculum so therefore this was an opportun opportunity for us I just want to make sure we we recognize the right individual you said Sarah Sarah Colin Colin so thank you to miss yes apply for this thank you all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries 4 Z thank you 5.02 outof country field trip to Peru I'm gonna try to pronounce these uh kusco got it uh muku Pichu Machu picu Macho picu and Lake tidy Kaka tit Kaka okay there we go very good job mirez well on that note thank you for that introduction Mr President and board members I am here today as we have a request from Crownpoint high school for your approval for an outof country field trip to Peru during the Spring of 2026 this will offer our students an opportunity to authentically use their language while also being in an immersive environment throughout this tour and really expand their knowledge of the world around them so tonight the administration is recommending the school board approved the outof country field trip to Peru by Crownpoint high school students for spring 2026 travel you for the recommendation of the administration for approval of the outof country field trip to Peru by Crownpoint high school students in the spring of 2026 March 27th through the April 6th may have a motion second motion by Mr Smith second by Mr Vasser questions none all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries 4 Z thank you Mr Ramirez heck of a trip I'll tell you that details that's pretty decent cost 5.03 policy update second reading and approval Mr ke thank you Mr President board members we're looking uh to wave a second reading and approve three uh policy Updates this evening uh policy uh 8330 which is an old educational records policy uh originating with Neola will be converted to isba policy 4100 uh policy 0100 will remove the term IEP because it is no longer a mandated state test and then uh policy 1613 we're converting that into a universal policy for student supervision and Welfare so we're again looking for a waving of the second reading and approval uh this evening for these three updates you've heard the recommendation of the administration uh to approve these new policies uh policy updates along with waving the second reading may I have a motion second motion by Mr badjack second by Mr Bass questions or discussion on these stre thank you for changing the balance appreciate thank you Mr Vasser for catching that any other questions all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries 4 Z approval of donation to The Solen Robinson Library Mr Reese thank you Mr President members of the board the Solen Robinson PTO has raised funds through their uh book program at Solen Robinson and they have raised over your limit of $5,000 you required not required but has to be brought to your attention to approve the donation therefore we're recommending approval of $ 5,159 187 donation to The Solen Robinson library from the soland Robinson PTO thank you Mr Rees you've heard the recommendation of the administration for the approval of the $515 187 to the Sol and Robinson library from the PT s and Robinson PTO I have a motion Mo second motion by Mr Smith second by Mr babjack question or discussion all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries 4 Z 5.05 approval of donation to cown Point High School best buddies Club Mr ree thank you similar to last year uh this family has donated uh proceeds from a fundraiser that they had held and this time they're they want to direct it towards the best buddies program at Crownpoint high school so with that recommending approval of $9,000 donation to The Crownpoint High School best buddies Club you heard the recommendation of the administration of the approval of the $9,000 donation to The Crown Point High School best buddies Club I have a motion second motion by Mr Smith second by Mr Vasser question or discussion extremely generous would like to thank both Rick and Bridget uh Mangan for that donation and helping out that great program thank you all those in favor please signify by saying I I I those opposed motion carries 4 Z 5.06 the sale of 200 200 East North Street Mr ree thank you um as we went through the process throughout the course of this calendar year um we got to the point where we're ready to receive bids uh for the purchase of the old Administration Building at 200 East North Street with that we received two bids the highest and most responsive bidder was brown Broadfield LLC the amount of 650,000 recommend to approve the selling of 200 East nor Street to Broadfield LSC that amount you've heard the recommendation of the administration for the approval of the sale of 200 East North Street to Broadfield LLC in the amount of $650,000 may I have a motion second motion by Mr Smith second by Mr babjack question or discussion so thank you for all the work folks have done on this I never would have imagine it would be this uh once this is finalized Matt clean this building and land correct again just Mr Vasser sentiments about um this was a process that probably we didn't think it'd be done in a year somehow some way got done so with everybody else yourself Mr Reese and everybody behind the scenes that also contribute to that thank you on behalf of the Bard with that all those in favor please signify by saying I I I those opposed motion carries 4-0 5.07 Lake Street Chiller compressor and and installation Mr Reese towards the end of the cooling season this year we had a chiller go down specifically to compressors at Lake Street Elementry uh so with that we are in need of getting those compressors which is a what I would consider a minor repair it's on our schedule to replace those chillers here in a year or two we'll probably bring that to you sooner rather than later but because the lead time for chillers at this point is anywhere from 18 to 24 months out uh we want to make sure we get the chiller up and running for next uh Cooling season which will begin obviously in in April hopefully March but probably April uh so with that we have some U fixes we need to do in purchasing of these two compressors so with that we receed bids uh quotes I should say and prison Precision control system was the low bidder at $917 for5 recommending them to do the work thank you Mr ree you've heard the recommendation of the administration for the approval for replacing ch compressor at Lake Street Elementary in the amount of 91,4 to Precision control systems and oh nope that's it may I have a motion second motion by Mr babj second by Mr Vasser questions or discussion all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries 4 Z 5.08 Colonel wheeler dishwasher bit approval correction Mr ree I apologize for bringing this item back to you this month last month you approved uh the purchase of this installation this dishwasher to CNT design with it we had a price tag on it of 200 $200,500 there was a typo in that recommendation we went to enter the requisition into the system we identified it so with that we're asking for the correction to be made to $220,500 thank you Mr ree you've heard the recommendation of the administration for approval of the wheeler dish dishwasher bid to CNT design equipment company for a total of $220,500 replacing last month's approval of the $200,500 may have a motion motion by Mr sman second second by I missed second by Mr Vasser all those oh I'm sorry any discussion or questions all those in favor please signify by saying I I those opposed motion carries 4 Z Item six policy updates first reading Mr Aiwa thank you Mr President board members um this is just for information only and a first reading uh the isba fall update has uh brought to us some mandatory updates here for this uh this school year one of them is uh regarding animals on school property so uh policy 8405 is a niola policy there is a section in there that will be removed has some redundant language in it we want to be consistent um with our language on on this topic so policy 8405 will be um amended policy 8390 is the old NE or is Neola policy for animals on school property that one uh we are looking to retire and then replace it with a standalone policy by isba 5732 again much U fewer words to achieve the same goal according to the ISB folks we have spoken to about this uh so in addition to updating the animal of animals on uh classroom or school property uh we are also going to include employee reference checks policy at 312 now this is different than background checks this is reference checks for those folks that that we hire we need to check with their past employer and whatnot and then in addition um a federal grants and awards policy policy 61 C so these are for a first reading only and we will bring them back next month uh thank uh any questions at this time if there's anything between now and the last next time for the approval I just already some clarification on the animals and uh on the corporation property this includes sporting events and things like that anywhere on school property in classrooms as well I I know there was an issue last last year attending a baseball or softball game where we had a couple dogs on the left field line so I just want to make sure that was part of this to make sure that's included okay yes thank you uh item seven tonight uh information Rec recognition item superintendent Discussion Group 7.01 uh Mr basser anything from SE or lake this evening our next meeting is next Tuesday okay great thank you Mr Smith anything from Crown Point yes we we had a meeting November 4th unfortunately I wasn't able to attend as I had a previously scheduled trip but they did share the Tif the Tiff district presentation and Tiff spending you see that it's a buting plan it's most comprehensive plan I have so if you want to see revenues expenditures for each Tiff District in the city of ground Point let me know and I'll be happy to share that information thank you and with our involvement in there I think we've got it in a pretty good spot with as far as the communication from both parties so thank you for your help with that uh I don't have anything uh nothing from Winfield so with that we'll move on a 7.02 director of Grants and assessments Mr Hartman yes thank you very much uh tonight in this just in the spirit of uh thankfulness and reflection U I have two girls that graduated from PR Point schools we moved here 1996 they attended Timothy Ball Elementary T PR school and many of you have stories about your children and their successes either graduating or going to school now and I think we're very fortunate as a Point Community community and Corporation with the education that we provide my daughters they graduated from Brown Point High School with uh both of them the 20 or 22 credits that they took with them to to college even at that time where the emphasis was not on uh the Dual credit but uh they had excellent experience I don't know if Mr Aiwa had either of my daughters in in class uh but all of us has these great stories about the education that our children are receiving here point and as parents uh I think all of us can say thank you thank you for what uh happens here in in Crown Point the leadership that is here in Crown Point and the opportunities I think that our our children receive so in a spirit of thankfulness at this time of year thank you all for all that you do thank you for the kind words Mr Harman thank you 7.03 director of Elementary education Dr China thank you Mr President and board members tonight I want to congratulate our Elementry School spell bow teams last week we had our districtwide spell bow contest over at Colonel wheeler uh it's always great when we get all seven of our schools together uh our students and coaches put in many many hours to prepare and I would argue that our students probably learned a lot about teamwork and grit and time management and Poise there's a lot of pressure to go up there and spell some of these words when all eyes are on you uh in addition to uh expanding their vocabulary and obviously becoming better spellers um but I would like to congratulate those teams and thank the colonel wheeler Administration for hosting us um and custodial team for helping with setup uh also want to thank Heather Cory Melanie poek and Barb Marill from Solen uh for organizing and leading the event um last thing tonight uh this time of year there's many different holiday events uh music programs lots of different philanthropic efforts going on at our elementary schools uh our teachers and staff put a lot of hard work and effort into making uh these meaningful experiences for our students um you know kind of going Beyond The Four Walls of their classroom and uh like Mr Harman um expressed with his message of thankfulness I just appreciate everything that our elementary school teachers staff members and administrators do to uh continue to make learning meaningful and engaging and exciting uh when it's related to the standards and kind of some of these bigger um you know very important themes uh this time of year so thanks everybody thank you Dr China 7.04 director of secondary education Mrs Ramirez thank you Mr President and board members I would like to start today by congratulating Crownpoint High School who was recognized by the college board as a um recipient of the Indiana advanced placement School honor role this really is a demonstration of exceptional AP programming colleg goinging culture that we have established at Crownpoint high school and then the ability for our students to earn college credits while in high school we are very fortunate that we last year offered 23 advanced placement courses we had more students taking um AP cour classes last year than the prior year we also saw more students score a three or higher last year and we had the highest number of exams administered since 2019 so we have really a thriving culture and a very well-deserved um recognition of college board AP honor role for our high school the other thing that I would like to uh mention tonight is a celebration of 50 years of the Orchestra program at the high school this started in 1974 with James Deal who many of you guys know who is a retired teacher he will actually be coming back back to conduct um a piece during this holiday concert season which will be really exciting to not only celebrate um all that or orchestra has become over the past 50 years but where it started back in 1974 um there will also be a pretty cool picture where we have the original Orchestra class from 50 years ago and then we're doing a recreation with Brooks help and the um Orchestra director so if you guys are interested in attending any of our high school orchestra choir or band concerts I have those listed for you here thank you Mrs Ramirez 7.05 director of exceptional education Mrs pascus good evening president Angel and members of the board um again just want to Echo the thank you to the Mangan family for the donation for our best buddies program the family has a golf outing every year um and uses the proceeds of their auction baskets to make this donation so um they're involved they attend our best buddies events at the high school um and we're just very thankful to have them as part of our team um tomorrow we celebrate Thanksgiving with a COR copia of offerings in our applied skills rooms at both wheeler and Taft so they're going to be cooking Thanksgiving meals for um the staff at both buildings so some of us from central office will also get to join in and be part of those celebrations um you'll also see in the coming weeks uh boards being installed at our playgrounds at the elementary they're called communication boards and they're for our non-speaking students um they're three by five and it's icons of common words students would use to interact with one another and then pictures of each specific playground with the names of um the equipment there and it's just to encourage communication for those students who may not communicate through voice like most of us um so our speech teachers will be working with their school staffs on how to best roll those out to the uh kids there wishing you all a Happy Thanksgiving same to you yes thank you Mr pascus uh Mr pascus before you step away um can you make sure that we get the dates for the uh I know it's usually later on but we don't I want to miss since I had the opportunity for the uh basketball games and things like that sure yep I I know schedules deviate so I want to make sure and everybody likes a chance to do that and also I know the one evening where they do the uh cheerleading grou kind recognize somebodys one the basketball games that's one I don't like to miss that one okay make sure we get those States for you thank you very much 7.06 ass assistant superintendent Mr Gan fery thank you Mr President board members um at our last board me uh meeting we mentioned that we were having parent safety meetings and we had one on October 22nd we followed up with one at Colonel wheeler on October 30th and I just wanted to thank all the First Responders the police the fire and the city workers that showed up and showed support as well as all of our building level administrators so we just really had a a great representation from the entire Corporation and theity City partners and it's we're only safe it's that partnership goes with those folks so a big thank you for them for supporting us on those meetings and something I think we'll probably do on an annual basis give parents an opportunity to see how uh we prepare and prevention and our response that we do for our kids in our schools uh another item I just want to let you know that our Learn Academy which we do annually has kicked off this month we'll be offering uh teachers teaching teachers um sessions from November all the way into April 30 three sessions in total we have seven already in uh over 200 Educators have participated in those sessions um all of the sessions have taken place right here in this building so great use of um our board rooms that we have here and it's a really great place for our our folks to learn and I want to thank Amy helmouth and Jeremy Walker for helping schedule all of those sessions and all those people to get in here and uh keep it rolling and of course I want to thank all of our Educators who participate not only partic presenting but also just showing up to to always try to get better so that's what it's all about so thanks to everybody involved in thank you Mr Gan firery and this year the Lions actually have something to be thankful so for so enjoy that so good couldn't resist 7.07 Chief human resource officer mran thank you Mr President uh one item this evening I just like to thank all of our uh leaders that's building principales Administration uh even our directors last week we we held a training for our new hire or application software so all of our leaders uh requested a posting for a new job that will be up on our uh new sites and then they actually then applied for that job so they went through the application process so they all experienced what applicants will go through to either apply for a job in the classroom uh Food Service Transportation buildings and grounds um and that that process for having them go through that gave uh our department and HR some wonderful feedback so that we can really customize things so that they know that all of their applicants are going through the right experience and the right questions are getting asked uh as we start to screen folks with this new uh Frontline recruiting and hiring software so we go live tomorrow night Brooke yes we ready to go uh from that point I'm we be using uh this to uh ask folks to apply and review applications I want to thank everybody for the support and uh Focus uh if you will you gave uh me and our professional development uh meeting last week to get this done so thanks to all of our leaders and directors thank you Mr K 7.08 Chief Financial Officer Mr ree thank you I've got two items tonight one I'd like to thank Miss pascus we're going through a process where December one is our official special ed count uh and the initial run we we found some data issues and she working with the her staff and the technology staff I have identified now uh what over previous over last year at this time we're up over a hundred students in special education for that count it's going to generate little over $100,000 uh to the school corporation through the funding for this so I want to thank Herer staff for the diligence of working through that process and last but not least I want to report out to you that uh last week we received the bids on our $5 million goo bond issue those were successful we were able to keep that under the interest cost we identified You by about $30,000 less than what we reported earlier uh so we'll close on those funds on December 18th they'll be in our bank account at that point so thank you for that thank you Mr ree 7.0 7.09 director of communications Mrs Allen thank you good evening we spoke earlier this year about customer service and Hospitality in our buildings as a Communications initiative a couple of weeks ago we sent a a survey to a random sampling of appearance in our district to ask them about their customer service experience in schools and here at central office we had questions like did you get help for the issue that you were seeking help for if not were you directed to the correct person based on the interaction with the person you spoke with did you feel that they valued relationships with families Etc we had really positive results so I just want to thank our front office teams and here at central office for all the work that they do I was really encouraging to read some of those responses that came in and then also um kind of a nonhuman customer service um initiative is we now have a chat bot on the front of our website I don't know if you've seen it if you've been to the website recently it's just a little circle it's in the bottom corner that says ask the chat bot a question and as long as the information that you seeking is in our website you can a question and it will find you the answer so the goal here is to reduce the amount of time it takes for families to find the information that they need the metric that we're seeking is at least 20% reduction in navigation clicks on our website so far that's looking like we'll definitely be able to do it now the catch is it has to be built into the website for it to answer so it cannot help you with your homework questions students have tried um we can see every question that's submitted and so anything that's not on the site thatone looking for we can do a better job of building that in making it accessible thank you m 710 superintendent of schools Dr Terell thank you earlier this evening you approved the grant for the robotics for ele schools last it's been week ago now uh Mark and I and Nick were able to go with Sarah coin and visit Winfield and Solen and see their stem rooms in action uh kindergarteners in one at Winfield and that they were it was amazing to see what those kindergarten students were doing and um the number of them in the room and their Hands-On activity that they were all a part of and just stem is quickly becoming a rival for um our other uh creative arts classes as being the favorite one that's offered out there I hear that repeatedly um so PE music library and art have the work cut out with them to keep up with stem so thank you guys for supporting that uh also this past weekend my wife and I were able to attend drama Productions started off with Peter Pan at Colonel wheeler on uh Saturday um again the kids um the work that they did all the adults the teachers who were involved with that it was an amazing production and then Sunday went to Matilda at the high school again just topnotch and amazing everything from the actors to the Musicians to all of the support one of the really neat things though was to go to the fifth grade preview at the high school and they actually had all of the kids come on stage who were involved in that production and it was 25 to 30% are the actors the rest are all all the other people the set designers the costume designers lights uh sound uh musicians so it's just really cool for our kids to see all of the things it takes to put on a drama production like that it's not really just the actors as a matter of fact they're the smaller percent of it all so last one um really exciting news came through today crowntown media CPTV news at the high school uh won their third consecutive national award for the work that they do um our kids again at the program there is just amazing really uh exciting they're getting a new set and new uh broadcasting desk should be coming in next week um and it's every bit of anything you would see out of a news station from Chicago or any other major city like the desk down in front of it got a digital board will be displaying stuff while the students are broadcasting their newscast um again we just appreciate the leadership there and the kids and the work that they do thank you Dr Terell uh item eight other busit the board anybody have anything good we'll move on item nine Stevens appreciation and recognition Mr B I don't know our secretaries do especially the ones that are secretary slash treasure a lot Mr Mr like to say uh hope everybody has a Happy Thanksgiving safe safe travels if you're heading out anywhere uh enjoy the time off thank you Mr Smith just Echo Mr bjack sediments I just want to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving family hope we have time play you know we we truly do have so much to be thankful for U sometimes when you're in the the midst of it you're working you're grinding you're doing your job you don't step away and actually just appreciate the blessing that we do have and I just want to share quickly the story that happened me recently that I think reflects on all of you in this room in the school corporation as a whole um I was uh there was an incident where there was a a loss of life another Community School Corporation and U we had a Rel ship with him through my kids and this and his childhood past and and one of the things that happened that came through it that u a superintendent one of the nearby School corporations came up and approached me and just said I just want you to know that your school corporation is phenomenal and you have everybody acts with so much class and just dignity and character and I you know we don't always hear that so I wanted to share that with with both the leadership and administration I'll spare the name of the administrator who said that to me but I think it's that you all hear that and I agree with what Mr Hardman said earlier today having a child have a daughter who's graduating college now it's hard to believe you blink and it's like wow it's over but having a child go through the school corporation receive the benefits and if you have the ability to step away and watch how how how well our school corporation is ran how it's administrated how special the students are and the people are the teachers it it really just it it it's amazing it really is so I just want to commend all you all I hope that you take time away to appreciate the job you're doing relationships you have and the impact that you've made on so many students and so many lives because it is felt and it's not just felt within our own Community it's felt outside of the community so um the only other thing I wanted to say is that the robotics team I think had a lot of success too I think they went to the semifinals again and I just want to acknowledge them we've done a good job acknowledging so many people but you know these programs as we've seen them they just grow and grow and grow the success that comes with that is just phenomenal um Miss pasc has talked about the uh the parks the U I don't know word is for the elementary schools but I'm reminded U when we talk about the playgrounds of the elementary school that just a few years ago Mr babjack without saying as much pretty much said they stink and you know we've made a difference now and they don't stink anymore they're excellent but I love hearing the fact that we're expanding that now into to children that are non-verbal or those that need additional equipment I just want to encourage all us as administrators continue to do that we really need to make sure every child is recognized on those on those playgrounds I just think that's phenomenal so that was great news that was music to my ears so just Happy Thanksgiving to everybody appreciate all your work you do thank you Mr Smith uh mine is to all those that were involved some currently up here some that have moved on that were involved in making sure we switched our schedule around because when it first came out and that's included the fall break break week uh moving around and the extra day now on Thanksgiving and I've heard nothing but Kudos from start to finish you name the families new families that are here that fall break is now a full week that they get an extra day here and that we work that into the calendar with advanced notice so um all those that were involved in that decision and board members that were involved in proving that um those are some of the small things that go on notic but lately during right after fall break week and uh just people planning trips it is a nice addition to know that they can get away a little bit and move on and we all understand that their kids are supposed to get educated from us and through us but at the same time uh the outside you know adventures with vacations trips are part of growing up and enjoying that time away so thank you to all those that are there and sentiments of Happy Thanksgiving to all um I'll be heading to Kansas City see two daughters that uh work there and I'm not one to travel much but when it becomes family and part of it and yeah it's you make sure you can get it done when you can so with that being said uh thank you all again Happy Thanksgiving to all and I will look for a motion to adure motion by Mr Smith second by Mr babjack all those in favor please signify by saying I I those oppos motion carries 4 Z thank you everybody for
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e all right I got six you guys good all right I have six o'clock i' like to call the meeting to the order with the Pledge of Allegiance who's our special guest there she is I for the Reas to the flag in America a nation under God jce oh all right welcome everyone to the November meeting of the Green Castle School schol board do we have any adjustments to the agenda yeah I'd like to add item and it's teacher appreci teacher appreciation Grant S for administrators that is eight be all right can I get a motion to add 8h for the teacher appreciation stif motion second aot in the seconds any discussion hearing none all in favor I I any opposed that will carry all right moving into recognitions Mr Gib yep Mr Roberts would you like again bring your helper back up here one more time well good evening um I have a second grader from her name is Willow um so this month's character trait was cooperation Willow shows cooperation each day by following directions working well in groups waiting her turn and making an effort to get along and share with others she uses kind words and her Gentle Spirit makes her so easy to work with she's an excellent example of how cooperation works so congratulations to Willow so this is cash and he is from Mrs as's class and cash is a great kid he's a hard worker and a great friend he is very easygoing which makes him a great candidate for this month where we are focusing on cooperation so he is always willing to help a friend switch Partners or work with a new group he is very cooperative and we very much appreciate conratulations [Applause] have the pleasure of introducing Mrs f one of our fifth grade teachers and she's been introduced all right this is Ben Gibson okay and he sets an example of excellent in behavior and cooperation he transitions easily from one thing to another without distraction he also conducts himself with maturity at all times and he's always smiling [Applause] okay I don't think my students here ours is Kaden Singley we call him KO around school uh KO is a great student that works hard he is kind to everyone and always shows enthusiasm for what he is learning he's a great friend in student and he always has a smile on his face every day and is ready to learn so thanks so this is our uh student of the month from the high school James Trey Bo bias Trey consistently demonstrates excellent cooperation skills by actively listening to his peers and balancing the needs of others while working toward shared goals TR supports classmates and respects different perspectives inside and outside the classroom with these qualities We Believe Trey is the best choice for November student of the month [Applause] cooperation okay is that it moving on all right do we have any public comments this evening nobody on the sheet all right moving on approval of the consent agenda uh which includes the meeting minutes of the special meeting minutes for October 24th 2024 the regular board meeting minutes for October 28th of 2024 which are posted on the door allowance and claims financial report and the Personnel report part 1 and two Mrs Roman yes hello um first in your um Finance packet you're going to see the payrolls for October 2024 first dated uh October 11th total payroll 465 72037 and as usual we've got to pay those um payroll taxes and some retirement that total was 13,29 25 and then the second regular payroll for October um was dated the 25th for a total payroll of 400 excuse me 448 , 6528 and along with that were those payroll taxes and retirement of 124,000 60867 and then next in your package you're going to see a list of prepays dated for October 2024 as you look through here did you have any questions about any of the prepays that I did for October okay total prepays for October were um 359,000 and then next in your package you're going to have a list of claims that are dated today November 25th 2024 again as you look through the list did anyone have any questions about anything specific did not no okay uh total claims dated today 19924 move on to the finance report um the fund report is next in your packet fund 101 education balance at the end of October 2024 3,712 38659 we're going to go down three lines to fund 300 operations balance at the end of October 31st was 193 10769 if you go to the very last page you're going to see the balance in all funds is 10,417 to 6248 next in your package you're going to see that bank of fund um report and that's just to show that our banks are all in balance with our funds that we hold here at the school and as you can see we are in Perfect Balance that's exactly where we want to be we now have the fund transfer report we need to show that to you every month so you can see what I'm doing with funds back and forth we had a fund transfer for school lunch of 46,000 41980 we always have that education and Ops transfer and then of course I also have report any transfers between Banks you'll see that there so you'll see that the amount um on revenue is exactly the same as the amount expended and then next in your package you're going to see a list of expenditures for Bond 20 21 and bond 2022 uh we've got a total expenditure of um 33 m97 55810 at the end of um actually it should say September 2024 we didn't have any expenditures for Bond 2022 um in September so we'll move on from that but we do have the new goo Bond 2024 and those funds are being held here at Corporation bonds for 2011 and 22 are both being held at a bond Bank we we basically write up our expenditures send them off to the bank and then they set the checks out to our vendors the goo bond is a little different we actually house that money here we're going to manage that like we do any other fund so you'll see that list for um fund 724 that's the fund number for the go Bond okay and there was a considerable amount of expenditures right out of the shoot um because uh if you remember you signed a resolution for us to go ahead and get some work um going and we paid those expenditures out of rainy day we needed to go ahead and transfer those expenditures to the actual Geo Bond you're going to see a list on there of everything that we've done and then of course you've got some things on here um uh some painting um lighting that type of thing those are all the vendors that we have paid since we acquired those funds so if you take a look on the last two columns you'll see the revenue column you'll see that was the revenue that we took in when we closed on the bond and then there on the the last page the expended you'll see our total expended at the end of October 2024 and that's where we're at on that and pending any questions I'd like to submit for approval any questions okay hearing no questions can I get a motion to approve so Move Motion do I have a second second a motion in a second any further discussion hearing none all those in favor I any oppos that motion will carry thank you Mr you're welcome all right moving on to reports Mrs MC um I just want to share um how exciting the Arts and Innovation Expo was this past Saturday um and how grateful I am to all of the staff members from our elementary schools or middle school and high school that helped um helped our students lead it it was all student L they organized it they did all of the setup and the problem solving and just to be able to have that type of large event being student L it's just amazing I think there were almost 400 people in attendance on Saturday so there were student booths and goods that were being sold community members coming in and selling their um things so it was just a great event I'm excited to see what happens with it I'm in the coming years just thank you to everyone who had something to do with it I saw a lot of nice pictures on social media that like a pretty good event great day to be a tag there all right moving on yes um we are going to have Dr hail and some of his students come up and talk to us about um The Fab Lab and TV and some of the projects they're doing down there so I want to introduce my two students there are a lot of students that worked on this project um and uce project I take these two students this is kada nor this is they were the ones that were at the very beginning how but to set the stage um with the engineering class last year um after they learned a whole bunch of skills designed we're going to Eng service family MERS neighbors problem and then one of the request we got where they have difficult time managing stay with the classroom there cables and laptops andn all sort issues so took and Andi that challenge figure out and so we're to see this so um we just started by um planning on some designs that looks more enjoyable to kids to use and then we kind of did um research on website and then we um come up with designs ourselves and then then we it ended up being dinosaur designs as you can see and then we we um inserted um we had a image of from the website of dinosaur on the fusion 360 device and then we did trace it out on our our sketch then we then the white image Right image is that one and in order to put um some devices a lot of devices we put um a lot of slots on the back the time you can see has there's a lot holes in there but um we thought this is not man this is not very manufacturable because because this is OT of complicated design yes we did not decide to so instead of doing the diamond and by doing this we also had to think of how we and it's cool because we get some tools that the first time we get use CNC class was cool to learnes so um that's about where their project ended um the semester the project time period was kind of over this was the biggest project by far of all the student projects they took it crazy far really impressed um and so I was like well we got deliver got to deliver something and so I decided because this was such a big project they need to 24 weeks so take this into one of my other CL manufacturing class and have them as an entire class take the next steps and so mind next slide and so what I did is I repeated to them all the constraints criteria School teachers given us and the feedback that was learned by K by it they learned a whole bunch about manufacturing be efficient material conscious and then something um we still Learned was enough so that's still something accompl project but so we we took that criter and gave it to them and said okay you guys groups start designing different things people so you see on the screen the top the top two and the left bottom one were different varieties of student design they're representative all the other student group that came together we brought them together the students evaluated each other's projects and um gave feedback and then from that the classes voted on a direction to go and then with all their input I design to bottom right we said okay we're going to build this decided to build six of them both because of our time and at the school year give additional feedback and then we take next and So based on that additional feedback and I should I should say one of the big things that we did we actually students there or students differents [Music] fully but one was but they were figuring I was I was sitting there like I can't wait until I have the same you know six years down that's steady steady learning process so you can see on that bottom one on and so you can see a simple modification so again I took this to my my first class this year and said okay this is what work great we had a couple and so they through whole change CH the whole thing so we can solve this additional problem and but says let's just what's the simpl solution to be the best solu so they came also added one more thing on the back to material and allow extra inad having a solid they came up with sols as as so that's a cool addition so to bring the whole story down the first half of this semester three classes that were pumping out next and came up with this result got and the result organized and that there are still and next that's the that's mind that's so that's that was people I did bring one thing so to to bring a book in [Music] we wanted to keep am of athe and so came up with ventilation holes that are and all what cool is especially with theol we and out [Applause] that's very cool kudos to you and your team that's innovation in its final they like that very awesome all right was that it for that all right very good all right moving on to Mr Gib yeah I just have a few uh quick updates uh this month recently attended the state superintendent conference and as you can imagine there's a lot of different kind of hot topics and a lot of information uh now being shared with just changes at both the state and federal level um had one of The Advocates there from aasa and uh one of the things shared was um just kind of the initial outlook on federal funding um with the new new Administration was was shared and obviously the house in the Senate have to have to work together to to uh finalize the budget um but essentially kind of working to be prepared for some cuts um federal dollars you know was mentioned um potentially there's up to a 25% cut in Title One funding U moving forward so for us like 25% would be $3,000 we received $333,000 in fund as as a district so um that was that was one version um and then in the house budget itself um calls for the elimination of funding for title two to title three inial budget and that'd be just over 66,000 dollar digital cuts and title to U is funding that we strictly use for for PD development for staff and then title three is multi I apologize because they keep changing that acronym multi language Learners um so you know whether it's no funding or compromise it does appear that we're headed on the path for some cuts to to federal spending and then obviously the the state level we know that this is a a budget year um for during the legislative session they open they've organized um a lot depends on the revenue forecast in December um but again even with that they're sharing to kind of be prepared for some for some cuts um so that would be our tuition support funding that we receive from the state and potentially um you know looking at um Some Cuts or reductions in our property tax readly because that's one of the big initiatives is looking at how we assess property values and how we collect tax revenue so uh two quick updates uh just kind of on funding um also out out of that meeting and I don't recall which which day was is released but the governor um Governor Braun has has released his uh new organizational structure and he setting it up with a cabinet style approach and one of the things that was shared with us is that there'll be a secretary for education and so rather than uh how we're currently uh set up with you know Dr Jenner leading the Department of Education um and then having commission higher education all these separate entities that have to work together to uh get some things done he's making some changes for operational efficiency and so the Secretary of Education will be responsible for the doe the commission for high education School for the Blind school for the de so they're consolidating um some of the responsibilties so we don't know how all that's going to shake out um but that was new information that um that I wanted to share and of course um the individual who's going to lead that endeavor has not has not been shared or announced as well so just something kind of to be to keep in mind as we move forwards um also out of that meeting um is the high school redesign so that's the changes to diplomas and really the change to really kind of your eighth grade through 12th grade experience um is expected to go to the State Board of Education for a vote um by mid December um and that is expected to to pass we haven't obvious seen the seen the final version of that um but it's expected that it's going to closely resemble that second draft um of that document so our high school team our administrators our our counselors everybody's kind of been trying to kind of work through what that might look like um because again if you might recall there's a very short window of which we begin implementing that um so we're going to continue to to work through that so that way obviously make sure parents and kids make changes or make decisions excuse me uh for their Futures with with courses um and then just briefly we're working on the school calendar for 2627 so expect to have something um by January for the board to to approve on that and then um Mrs good pastor uh Mrs Wilson and I met with Chief Jones with GPD to continue discussion on sros um at Green Castle and so where we kind of left that now um the ball is kind of in court city um in orderorder and in the police department in order to kind of move that forward since we were ready um to to move that forward so we're kind of waiting on them at this point so I look forward to to bringing something to the board for that future and then we did receive our 1782 notice so our budget order uh for next C year I will share some in-depth information with the board next month on that those are just a few few items that I wanted to update you all right moving on to Old business we have none new business now we have an approval request for the 20242 Procare therapy contract for TLP Services yeah so this is unfortunately this has kind of come before board um uh a couple of times already um where we've had a contract um with a contract provider lined up where it's fallen through and we do have have a new one um that we have moved forward with um and it is virtual um with an SLP Aid or assistance and uh since that change was made brought before the board again for approval where's this one out of this is out of Procare therapy last one was Boston all like closer yeah okay all right can I get a motion to approve second I have a motion in a second any further discussion hearing none all those in favor I I any oppos motion car CR sorry about that I have an approval request to establish FFA chapter for GMS and ghs all right so kids come for come forward come forward so this is a very exciting time a very uh exciting day and uh in order to move forward with establishing an FFA chapter um for Green Castle middle school and Green Castle High School we have to take a board action of which they can then uh provide uh verification to both state and national uh National organizations um you guys have anything you'd like to say just like to form introduce myself my name is aliser and I'm educator here in middle school and high school and being new to this community I greatly appreciate everyone's support and effort each chapter so I'm going let the students introduce themselves and talk about a little bit what we have in store Secret I'm Marshall and I'm serving as our in De wees and in the upcoming weing on doing advances throughout the Middle School different activities throughout the high school and going to our element and taking for it and we are working on getting sponsors for our like oural convention we will be participating in crop judging me judging public speaking Landscape Management have chicks in our animals because it's really good for us to learn about animals real life because I feel like we Mayers anything but mainly foreducational purposes so did you put eggs under an incubator is that we did did someone bring them in or where' you get them not fzed so was a good learning fail well if you want if you want to try again I can Brak some eggs in Spring I have roosters and chick so that is all okay well it's really awesome it's really really exciting it's good to see students here and it's good to see students here speaking saw many you know a couple different times tonight speaking before the board and adults and I just think that's just a good good thing in life and in general good practice and um we're really excited to hopefully move forwards here support your organization um you want to go ahead and I guess I make the recommendation uh the board approved establishing an FFA chapter for Green Castle middle school and Green Castle High School okay do I have a motion so moved second I have a motion and second there any discussion hearing none all those in favor I I any opposed motion will carry congratulations how many kids do we have we have roughly 80 students signed up and the high school we have still building on those numbers hopefully those numbers will continue in the middle school and we brought the high school ex and we do have cupcakes to celebrate this of our Bo meeting stay have cupcake I like hearing reps down the down the line about how it's going too very cool please come back awesome all right moving on I have approval request for corporate athletic sponsors Myers market for $1,000 can I get a motion to approve motion second have a motion and a second any discussion hearing then all those in favor I any opposed motion will carry all right I have a appr approval request for some donations what's at Green Castle Hometown Dental to Green Castle High School Champions together for $1,000 and Gary and Linda Huber fund for Cultural Arts and learning to Green Castle High School Art band choir GMS Art band choir and TZ TZ all right there we go TZ art and music for 8,2 82 is that 82,000 88,200 there we go many Zer y couple tyos we'll get it there each department will receive $1,025 that's correct there we go can I get a motion to approve make a motion to be approved second a motion in a second any discussion hearing none all those in favor I any opposed that motion will carry thank you very much I have an approval request for technical corrections to some Neola policies yeah so this is a technical correction um and per her our board polic allows for allows the board to um bypass two readings in order to make a technical correction that's whether there an approval request there and so the technical Corrections um that we discovered that need to be made um in a couple of policies um it listed um a couple of individuals specific individuals who are assigned to positions and so uh we are removing those names and just leaving uh the titles only and then U for personnel and benefits coordinator instead it'll read AAL and benefits coordinator and so it' be my recommendation that board allow us to uh to make those updates on first reading any questions on that okay no questions can I get a motion so Mo second I have a motion in a second do we have any discussion hearing none all those in favor I any opposed that motion will car all right I have an approval request for the second reading of Neil policiy special update June 2024 legislative changes and Edgar Ugg volume 36 number two yep so these were brought to the board for first reading uh last month so this month is a second reading uh and adoption and we discussed what some of those changes were uh last month and it' be my recommendation uh that the board approve of these updated policies any discussion on that no standard okay all right can I get a motion to approve motion second I have a motion in the second all those in favor any opposed that motion will car all right I have H first reading of Nea policies in line yep so I discovered um discovered two two more but still specifically with uh special education um it made a reference to Old National Trail uh special ed cooperative and that was out of out of date and so uh you'll see see the proposed update listed in that obviously special education Cooper cooperative and then this just first reading this month no no action okay very good and moving on to H we have the teacher appreciation style yep so we Department of Education and this is why it wasn't in I was hoping to have this in your packet before packets went out um but last Last Friday they released the uh allocations for the teacher uh appreciation Grant to schools um and you might recall that the the funds received from the doe go specifically to teachers you cannot use them for um administrators and so we have those essentially spreadsheet uh calculations calculate out those amounts Shar that out with our teachers today we're prepared to uh distribute that on the December 6th uh payroll and so just choosing to take care of our returning administrators uh who made that essentially the same criteria uh at the same time and at the same amounts um as our teachers and so those things were listed in listed in the letter that was placed on your your desk T this is something that we've done in the past okay any questions all right hearing none can I get a motion motion second I have a motion on a second any discussion hearing none all those in favor I I any opposed that motion will car all right do we have any other business I do not okay I did um I took a tour for veterans program which applaud the principles for what they do for the veterans program being a veteran myself um they do a wonderful job but I was able to tour to and I think um one classroom that called my eye was the music room at TZ and the work that she has done in there at um getting her own equipment and everything and I would love to see us get into a position to where um we might be able to help the teachers out with some resources that they would like at some point discuss how we might be able to um figure out a way to help teachers get the resources that they need with ins inside their classroom um um I think they were going to work with Dr hel and his group that they did some work in there but I'm sure that's just you know a microcosm of the entire School District but there's a way that we could work towards that um there's a lot of great things happen in the classroom and it's a a lot of burden on the teachers and I'd like to see um some effort made towards that as well you know looking towards what opportunities we have there if possible yeah we have we have some in place and they can work through their building administrators we set um Appropriations aside Wonder for for those things all right and to figgy back on that I was at Deer meow as well I think we had the Veterans Day celebration there well done with that that was very cool um it's nice to see some celebrations in the schools and a lot of smiling faces and little little kids with the flags and it was it was really cool so very nice with that um and uh those to the new lighting outside of mac and Alley in the signage very beautiful looks very nice at night time so very cool there heard yep very cool we haveo all the way School make Y and I'm hoping that it'll be done in time for some of those concerts that we have at the entrance of Parker Auditorium we have some additional things there some purple accent lighting and um some frosted glass with this is Parker's name that's going to go on the on the glass above above so it'll just be another another piece just to draw into that awesome Auditorium excited to see that very nice I like it all right we have have anything further before we move to close all right hearing nothing I will entertain a motion to adjourn move I have a motion in two seconds do we have any discussion on that all right hearing none all those in favor I any opposed motion carried thanks Happy Thanksgiving everyone Thanksgiving and we have cupcakes and don't forget
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e e e all right I'll go ahead and officially call the meeting to order and move to item A4 a roll call of members who are present this evening Mr Allen is absent Mr Mullen here Mr Melcher here Mr Roth here Mr Jer here Mr wall here Mrs Heim here all right move on to item A5 uh Mr trout are there any revisions of the agenda this evening there are not any revisions to the agenda this evening okay we'll move now to item B1 core values discussion what an exciting time for our board to be able to honor um our staff our students uh our community for the great things that are happening in our district district and so uh tonight we're excited uh to it is my privilege to highlight individuals and groups within our district to exemplify Huntington County Community School which perfectly aligns with our core values on November the 2nd Alex Alice competed in the 44th annual girls state cross country meet at the prestigious lever Gibson Championship Cross Country course in terod Indiana out of the best runners in the state Alice achieved an outstanding Ninth Place Place finish in the women's individual 5K with a five five minute 46.7 mile average I'm not sure I could walk that fast and and a finished a time of 17 minutes 57.2 seconds uh this incredible achievement adds to an already Stellar year for Alice not only has she secured her second top 10 finish in the state championship this year but she has consistently demonstrated the values of high expectations high achievement and accountability both in competition and in her training her drive and commitment inspired not just her teammates but our entire School Community congratulations Alice on this welld deserved recognition awesome job so proud of [Applause] you our second core value it's an honor to continue tonight's core value recognition with our second Honore a remarkable group of individuals who have demonstrated the trans formative power of community involvement and support this evening we are recognizing District 5 board member Mr Gary mlen CoCo Joe's Campground owners Mike and Tiffany Weaver and blessings in a backpack Representatives Chris Johnson Lisa Pulver Lisa Southworth and Helen Williams this group exemplifies our District's commitment to supporting every student every day in September CoCo Joe's Campground hosted its first annual car show a community focused event aimed at giving back thanks to their coordination and heartfelt efforts the event raised an incredible $12.75 every penny of the proceeds was donated to blessings in a backpack of Huntington County a vital organization that provides weekend meals to students in need across our district Mr mlen played a key role in the success of this event as a regular at CoCo Joe's he facilited the partnership with blessings in a back pack helping to ensure that the funds raised directly benefited the students and families who need it most the collaboration and generosity of this group directly impacted the well-being of our students ensuring they have the nourishment they need to learn grow and Thrive their dedication to Huntington County's Children and Families embodies the core values of hccsc they remind us all that when a community comes together we can truly make a difference on behalf of Huntington County Community Schools thank you for your extraordinary commitment to our students and Mission and for your partnership that will continue to invest in the lives of our students making for a stronger Community thank you so very very much [Applause] congratulations and Mr rth that concludes our core values for this evening all right thank you Mr Peters um now we'll move on to item C1 this is the opportunity for public comment uh no one signed the purple sheet when uh they came in but now would be your opportunity should you wish to address the board if You' please come to the microphone here so it could be picked up with the uh live stream and no one having come forward we'll move on to D1 special presentation chief operations officer as our at our last uh work session we had a pretty extensive discussion about the value of this position in our district um replacing our CFO who left a few months ago um we also discussed in pretty good detail about why a chief operations officer this time instead of Chief Financial Officer and so I'm just very proud tonight uh to introduce to you and recommend for your approval uh Mr Pat McGlothlin as the new um Co o for Huntington County Community Schools um Pat comes to us uh currently as the high school principal at Huntington North High School Pat's just done a tremendous job there and one in which um he has proven himself over and over again with his solid leadership a little bit about Pat um Pat I have the mic now I get to talk about you publicly uh been waiting for this time but no Pat is just been a tremendous leader he is a manchest Chester college graduate at a ba Bachelor of Science um who majored in secondary education with government and economics US History World Civilization um from Indiana University Purdue University at Fort Wayne he obtained his Masters in educational Administration and Pat also recently within the last couple of years um got his superintendent license as EDS from Oakland University uh Pat has been with us at Huntington North High School as the principal since 2022 uh previous to that Pat was the principal at Eastbrook High School from 2009 to 2022 and from per Heights High School from 2003 to 2009 with teaching experiences uh ahead of that um I will tell you that Pat is truly a valuable member of our administrative team and one in which I'm excited to work alongside him with Jay and Chuck and believe that Pat will bring a wealth of knowledge outstanding skills and disposition to this team to help move us forward for years to come so I'm very proud to recommend to you uh for your approval Mr Pat McGlothlin as the new coo and once and if you approve that I got some other items with the COO position then so I'm re I'm looking for your approval of this recommendation this evening right thank you Mr trout would anyone like to make a motion regarding the recommended approval I'll make a motion that we approve Pat McGlothlin as the COO is there a second second any questions comments or discussion before we vote all right hearing none we will vote on the motion to approve Mr mlin that's what I was asking are the results going motion passes six to zero okay all right Pat do you wanna you you got a couple things you want to say or yeah he's coming thank you Mr trout uh members of the board I appreciate the opportunity to serve in this capacity I'm looking forward to working alongside Mr trout Mr Peters and Mr brimberry um and the district to help in whatever way I can so thank you how about a nice round of applause for Mr M something not on the same page Cindy okay um Pat will be meeting with his staff uh tomorrow morning um Mr brimberry will also be there in the morning too but um one of the things I wanted to share with you is and to go over this again is this organizational flowchart of how the work is going to be done in our central office moving forward um as you can see um this change is also done not only to support um all the operations in our uh District but I also recommended this change for you to allow uh Mr Peters as the Director of Elementary Ed and Mr brimberry as a director of secondary Ed to to become more involved uh in the academics day-to-day within our district uh it's truly important to me that we that we impact academics at a higher level with this and to allow Jay and Chuck to do that work with our admin team and with our staff I have no doubt that that will have another positive impact um on our district the next slide here is to um show you um those areas that will directly uh Mr brimberry will be responsible for at this point in time you'll notice that um the classified staff areas that uh Chuck has been responsible for and also those areas have been associated with that move over and you'll see a slide here momentarily of that of Mr McGloin uh here is uh the next slide thank you is for Mr Peters um it's all the elementary buildings um that Jay will be directly responsible for along with prechool our ever growing preschool uh population that we have uh within our district again it could be easily overlooked of the impact that this move will have on our academics and this is the one of the primary reasons why we're making uh this move quite frankly the next slide here uh in that it shows you uh Mr mcgloin's direct UH responsibilities within our district um in that you will see that he will be overseeing and leading uh the director of Technology the Director of Finance which I have asked for your approval here later on in the meeting the director of food service of Maintenance and custodian uh transportation and Human Resources along with our Corporation nurses staff um Pat's got a lot to do um this will be a very uh busy time but one in which we need if you um it's important to for you to know when you look across that you'll see that Jay and Chuck and myself lead a lot of these current um departments now and we will continue to work with these departments with Mr mcglothin this entire second semester into the summer um and so I just wanted you to be able to see um what that is the next um the next slide is um here of how and some of you have asked me this question of how it relates to the business department um quite frankly right now this is something that's taken enormous amount of my time of Mrs Smith's time of Mrs Gray's time and um we have been having discussions about this but this shows you um the organizational flowchart as it relate to the business department that we have been discussing along the way to so I hope that this gives you the clarification for this lastly and um most importantly um Mr brimberry and Mr McGloin will be meeting with the high school staff tomorrow morning uh to go over this change uh at that time we will also be telling the staff that we will be posting uh this High School position uh principal's position tomorrow with the hope and the intent of bringing a name to you at the December 16th meeting if that does not occur uh we will have another option for your consideration at the December 16th meeting but it's Our intention to post this position and to look for a highly qualified candidate to fill in and to become the new principal at Huntington North High School on December 16th meeting questions comments okay thank you thank you we now move on to item E1 one:1 device pilot tonight we're pleased to welcome director of Technology uh Mike Sumpter uh who will be presenting up on the upcoming device uh pilot program designed to assist our students with higher performance in our classrooms starting to that how is our onetoone devices affecting our students achievement and over a period of time in working with the administration leadership team um this last year or two has been really eye openening to our administrators and to our leadership team so one of the things that we strategically do uh Jay and Chuck and myself we meet on every Tuesday and sometimes after those teams meetings when we're meeting with the principls some real powerful data comes into us uh with what the principles are seeing one of the things that they're seeing is students are staying up till 1 2 3 a uh for an example tonight before this meeting I went ahead and did a search on which students are whoops are online right now and shockingly the first out of the first 21 there were seven that were element kids and so here we are about 7:30 and some elementary students are on which is fine I guess doing work but one of the things that we've done is some of the research has shown that if kids are up really late at night watching YouTube doing movies playing video games and they're only they're only getting a few hours of sleep that means their performance here in school is going to drop off we have already students elementary kids that are not able to focus they have dis you know discipline issues well if you're not getting proper sleep you're going to have a problem so in moving forward um one of the things that we're going to do this starting on December second we would like to put together a small pilot program where K through five uh devices starting at 900 P pm at night to 7 AM there's no internet you literally got to sleep or you go get your mom and dad's cell phone do something then but but we're just hoping that we can help curb um this desire to be in YouTube or anything that's beyond normal bedtime hours the other piece that uh for the secondary grades six through 12 we're looking at 1200 am to 5 a now the reason we pick 12:00 a is really because of sports we have a lot of kids that are busted all over everywhere for events we want to give them enough time so that they can get ready for the next day um that particular group is really intriguing because at 500 a.m you'll see a bunch of kids online doing homework it's crazy but it's it's the truth and uh and that's really really intriguing one of the things that I've had the liberty of being a part of when I was at Concord was that demographic those parents would use their students device as their only device for the family that created another type of um variable in the mix so um it's really intriguing what happens when some of the students are staying up or the parents have the device or whatever by turning them off our goal is during this pilot program program let's see what's going to happen let's try to help with the mental health of our kids and and that's it's really the the underlying uh premise of this pilot um one of the things that we would like to do starting on the 2nd December 2nd that evening is when we had turn it on um we are wanting to focus on sleep patterns some of the mental health overall academic achievement of those kids and most importantly the discipline I've heard Mr brimberry go no disrespect go on and on about discipline discipline discipline same thing with Mr Peters how can we curb that well if we have kids that aren't going to bed till 2: 3 a.m.
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president Dr Smith members of the ward uh tonight is the second step of our our second public hearing for our 1028 um public hearing this is our Blue Ribbon Phase 2 project that we are um planning to launch which would be our 2025 to 2029 elementary school expansion and renovation and energy conservation Project tonight with us once again is Mr Jeff quackin bush from Barnes & thornberg uh ready to present the legal aspects as well as Mrs Belia gray to speak on the financing aspects and I will at this time turn it over to Mr quakenbush thank you Mr miles Madame President members of the board Dr Smith it's a pleasure to be with you this evening so as uh Mr miles stated this is our second preliminary determination public hearing on these projects and financing um as we've done in the past when we've had our second preliminary determination public hearing on projects none of the information that was presented at the November 11th meeting has changed from tonight so you have a choice as a board whether to go through that entire presentation again uh and if you would like us to do that we would do that or you can wave that if no one in the community and the public wishes to have that presentation done at this point we can go directly to public comment so it's it's your pleasure whether you want us to go through that presentation or to just go directly to public comment if no one in the audience wishes to have that presentation board members need a presentation audience members need the presentation on the 1028 again okay who done I did have one question at the last board meeting IID asked about the overall debt of the district and for public record could you please share what our overall debt is at this time sure sure I believe it's important for the members of the public to know sure yeah good evening um So currently the total outstanding indebtedness of the school corporation is 473 mil8 32,8 44 um to put that into context that is per capita a little under $3,900 per per um the population of the District of 121,000 and as a percent of net assess valuation 6.8% 6.8% and as a percent of gross assess valuation it's 4% thank you very much yep you're welcome so at this point if there are no other questions from the board then you should open it up to the public for any questions or comments they would have regarding just this project or this financing and then at the conclusion of that you can close the public hearing and move into your regular action items absolutely do we have any public comment this evening on this presentation there's no public comment we'll go ahead and close um the 1028 hearing now if you would stand with me we'll open our regly sched meeting Al to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all we did have a work session uh on the 11th um this is our first full board meeting since the election so I would like to formerly congratulate um Shayla M Holland on being our district one representative um Miss Amy Norman on our District 3 and um Miss Crystal Pucket on being our at large and a great thank you to um Eric Young for the campaign you ran um we will go on now to Blue Ribbon update Mr Smith Madame President Dr Smith members of the board bills are Middle School serving lines are continue almost finished to reopen uh new hallway there just on the south side of the two serving lines uh new front facade uh entrance way the metal is being uh uh applied to the underneath and around the fascia bells are Middle School tennis courts uh well they look complete not quite we we'll finish the top coating and the painting uh one spring breaks and we get some more temperature uh bser Orchestra room is going back together uh it now becomes all ADA Compliant uh Paul Creek Valley a lot of hallway going back in flooring and wall covering small gym is two coats on they're stri in and Logo going on with two more codes fil F Creek Valley front entrance way way the uh metal is starting to go on the front entrance there tennis court same position we have all the concrete walkways in uh Landscaping will follow along with the fencing Walk Valley softball again the sidewalk and Landscaping a little more work to do there soccer scoreboards up and operational new lecc uh the new interior walls are progressing along with the MEP mechanical electrical and plumbing and also the uh more of the interior walls in office space and the exterior has started uh and they will continue to walk around the building they continue to do site work that is started this week week and we'll continue on thank you Bard do you have questions about the Blue Ribbon update I just had a question um I wanted to thank you it's it's looking really good will the athletic fields Outdoors be ready at the middle schools for the spring athletic season that's the plan we got the seating Dam grasses started so softball and baseball will be ready to go thank you there any more questions about the Blue Ribbon if there are no more questions about the Blue Ribbon thank you Mr Smith we'll move on to the Neola policy updates Dr harb Madam president Dr Smith members of the board on November 11th at the work session I brought forward uh Neola revision packet volume 36 number two for first reading I now bring the revision Vision packet back to you for second reading happy to answer any questions you might have school board do we have any questions on those new policies I did have um a question regarding two policies just for clarification policy 2623 and policy 5410 they're around student assessment and promotion placement and retention um I know that our policies are changed following state law and and I wanted to verify that this was in regards to the third grade retention rate um put out by the state and I did have a clarifying question um so the children are given the test for I at grade two and then if they do not pass how many attempts are they given in third grade to pass I know it said a total of three tries okay so they would have their first try and second grade and then two op opportunities in third grade the the March and if they don't pass in March summer assessment okay so there's an assessment in the summer you said okay yes okay and then that will go into effect this spring correct for correct third graders corre okay okay thank you that all I did we give the test to second graders this year yes we did um if there are no more questions on Neola policies we'll move to the financial update Mr miles thank you madam president uh tonight's financial report will include the last two months uh you may recall at our October meeting due to the timing of that meeting we did not have our September uh reports prepared so tonight you'll see both September and our October uh transportation and general fund reports first on the screen we've got our general fund um as it has been trending throughout the year again both our Revenue um outpacing our our projection so we're in a good place as well as our expenses less than originally projected so uh leaving a a um a better than expected or better than projected cash balance at the end a little over 17 million there onto the transportation fund likewise transportation fund through September in a good place uh with revenue and expenditures ahead of projection as well as our cash balance at the end of September just under $2 million as we move on to October see much much more of the same ending balance general fund at the end of the month is just over 18 million in the general fund and for transportation about $630,000 great Bo do you have a questions Mr miles we heard a moment ago uh the debt that we have incurred um as a district a little over $400 million can you help me reconcile I mean I know that in in business we often run in debt without without Revenue gain I'm not clear on how you balance that at a school corporation level with a debt that's almost half a billion dollars so good question um so our debts our debt debt is structured um and funded by our debt service funds and also by our so the revenue that we take from local taxpayers um collect that twice a year through our property taxes um also funded through our referendum so part of that debt that was mentioned earlier was approved um for those you know those larger projects through the high school so those funds completely separate we we submit that with part of our budget each year which was approved um a couple months ago and we will hear back from the state sometime later in December um with our new budget which will uh account for the funds to to fund that those debt payments so pardon my ignorance here um but is that common for other school districts to run a debt that high what we really what I don't I don't know exactly what how to compare our oh sure Belia is here we've got Belia great so hi there that's a very good question before I came here I was also looking at some um other districts in the area because Lawrence Township as Mr miles stated um you did approve a a referendum and so your your taxpayers did already approve a larger borrowing outstanding the the district that I looked at um was Washington Township and they would be I think most comparable to you because they also approved a large referendum several years ago and their outstanding debt right now is $413 million and so as I I mentioned the percentages of assess valuation so Lawrence townships is in the 6% range Washington townships is in the 5% range and so for some of our districts where you have growing enrollment the um you have growing enrollment you have a tax base that according to the standard and pores report can support the level of debt it is a little bit higher but the um the detail of the report that standard and pores provided said that based upon your growing enrollment and the economics of the school corporation that it felt very comfortable about the level of depth that you're supporting does that help and I I would like to ask what is our audit process every year what process do we use for the audit Mrs Gray ran away on that one so we go through an annual audit that's uh as one of the 10 largest school districts in the state we're subject to uh a gap account accounting audit which um we we because we're one of the largest districts that went into place um about four years ago um and so we go through an annual audit we convert our books from um a cash basis over to more of a business type um Gap system so it accounts for payables and receivables and so it gives a very accurate U uh view of where the district is financially um so once again we do that we do that annually each of those um audits has turned out variably and um when we when we do that audit we report our debt I'm sure right so what is our bond rating right now so we have a bond rating and I'm sure Mrs Gray probably is I see her grabbing papers right now we get that updated each time we have a a debt issuance and so standard repor comes up and it's the the rating is is sort of in two pieces and I'm going to let Mrs Greg thatl that yeah the so there are two components to the school corporation's ratings there's actually two ratings that you have outstanding one is your what they call the um issuer credit rating which is reflective of the the credit worthiness of the school corporation your current rating is a and it's stable so that means that standard employers thinks that over the next one to threee time frame you're likely to stay at that a level the second rating that the school corporation has is called um a um underlying or uh programmatic rating and that is based upon the school's eligibility for the state intercept program um the state intercept program is a program where if you meet certain criteria basically certain coverage levels you're eligible for like if for some unforeseen reason you were unable to um make your debt payments this uh intercept would kick in and make those payments that has happened almost zero times um in history but it does provide a bolstering component to your overall rating and that is a doua plus also stable can I ask a followup question president M president yes of course when was the when at what point was this rating given was that oh just a couple months ago August s so in August okay thank you very much thank you very much you're welcome Matt miles will you formally introduce your friend where does she work and what's her Capac I kind of skipped right over that thank you Dr Smith this is Mrs Belia Gray she's principal at Baker Tilly which is our bond counsel uh Municipal adviser Municipal advisor thank you I'm your Municipal adviser Bond Council Jeff Jeff thank you I'm here for all things Finance thank you yes anything else any other questions for me I don't think so thank you very much for your information appreciate it okay so um if there are no more questions from the board um we will go on to um our committee reports and Miss done we just did policy so please help us with this yes so it looks like we have policy revision packet volume 36 number two has been moved to Second reading and is ready for board approval and Publishing should we vote on that this evening moving forward the policy committee will work on administrative guideline revisions packet 36 number two there are 11 guidelines needing revision lastly uh this past Friday Dr harburger received a new revision packet volume 37 number two the update includes proposed revisions to seven policy two new proposed policies and proposed revisions to four administrative guidelines um and that will come before the board in the next uh several months thank you again to Dr harburger for your work on this and thank you Miss Dunn for reading and editing it's a lot I got new glasses did you notice yeah okay um Parks and Recreation Miss Pucket yes uh the Parks and Recreation we have the Winter Market taking place um on Thursdays there are numerous Thursday dates so you can visit cityof lawrence.org to see specifically what Thursdays that those are I have them here but that's a very long list um and they are taking place at the at the community center um also we have our Winterfest coming up which my family and I look forward to going to um that will be on where did it go hold on it's the whole thing hold on so it's November 30th through January 5th Winterfest hold on you guys let me scroll back through Saturday 30th there we go thank you guys on the 30th and that too will be in Civic Plaza um we also have um the parch board uh we have the golden hour game days on Thursdays from 11: to 12: p.m.
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the flag please to flag United States of America to the stands one nation indivisible [Music] andice roll for Al present Teresa present Michelle here K here Lis here Dr Cronin here Lauren here Bita here Richard Julie here here thank you we going to move down to recognition spot you can't skip out on us like that hello everyone is this is the microphone ready to go good evening everyone is Michael I'm the intern principal at West High Middle School this year um and I'm here to present on Spotlight your school uh but before I begin I'd like to take a moment for remembrance of two individuals important to our Westside Family we had a sad start to our school year with the unexpected passing of Paul fanof the loving husband of jeie fanof one of our administrative secretaries which you may know and is here with me today and this was followed by the passing of one of our teachers Mrs nimer at 43 years old which taught sixth grade social studies um Mrs nimer was at West hiide Middle School before I arrived and she was very instrumental and helping me acclimate to the new school I had arrived at she was highly involved in all aspects of our school including being a part of many committees such as the sunshine committee the PBIS committee the theater group as well as volunteering in most of all our after school activities she was an extremely giving person who was enormously well-liked by students and staff alike and she will be greatly missed I appreciate our Westside Community for coming together during such a tough time as well as our greater Danbury family I want to say thank you to the members of central office who offer support during this time and to Park Avenue and a schools for your cards and posters that you sent to our school and I want to give a special thanks to Rogers Park Middle School for the decorate decoration of our Teachers Lounge and for providing breakfast and all that you did to help us doing such a tough start to our school year I'll begin with some of the spotlight and uh data information that we'll be sharing the first slide is showing our total accountability SC score for the past four years the accountability index as many of you may know is is calcul calculated across several indicators such as achievement growth chronic absenteeism the percentage of test takers and the physical exam given during PE classes as you can see we have made growth the past several years but took a small dip this past year which I believe can be attributed to a couple of factors which I'll discuss in a moment the next slide may be hard to read but I'll smize pretty much what it says this slide focuses on the proficiency levels at Westside Middle School the the proficiency levels would represent the students to score a three or four and the espa exam and both Ela and math so in short those are the students who are on grade level or higher um last year we had a total percentage of 51 students of 51% of all students in all three grades uh at Proficiency in ela although the good is that we're still above 50% in proficiency as a school we did have a slight dip and went down from the year before where we were at 57 and uh I think some of this could be attributed to just a change in staff we had three staff members in ela change we lost two to different districts and eighth grade and two seventh grade teachers in the middle of the year one to a different school district and one uh because of the passing of her husband who was a teacher at Rogers Park uh Middle School um we'll keep an eye on those numbers a little bit more but I expect them to bounce right back up with a little bit of more consistency it's hard to see there but I'll surise it as well because in that one red box area if you can see uh those show the percent per the different grade levels and you can see that for ELA they were all above 50% but for math pretty much for the 3 years I've been there we've lived around the 30 percentile range the high 30s uh with the exception of eth grade last year being at 41% but as an average of all three classes math was an area where we did increase in proficiency from 36% the prior year we went up 1 percentage point to 37% this past year now this slide shows the the growth achievement per students so growth is a little different than proficiency where students are either at grade level or not depending whether they can achieve a three or four uh the growth levels is going to show some of their growth uh from one year to the next that's why you only see seventh and eighth grade years because you would need at least 2 years for comparison to see how they bounce up from one year to the next and something that you see here is that even though we were we're very strong in proficiency uh in laa you can see the past 5 years it's more of a little up and down bouncing up and down of inconsistency through those years uh math is kind of the opposite where we're not where we want to be in proficiency but there has been some growth in those years where we started in the low 40s mid-40s two years back to back of 70% uh growth rate and achievement uh Target achievement achieved and then a little bit of a dip last year and that uh because of this um we do want to show that consistency and growth in ela but they're still performing at a proficiency level above 50% in math we want to take some of that growth that you see there and have it carry over to proficiency so that's one area that I wanted to Target uh in our strategic planning for the Year this was also used with I ready another this is the fall diagnostic that was given to students right at the beginning of the year they'll take three uh September of course the next one moved up uh right after Thanksgiving break in December and then following uh in March this this is the fall Diagnostic in math here you can see we have some really good numbers and and promise from our sixth grade group right there coming in so they came up in pretty strong from elementary school but what I've seen more the past 3 years so what you see in uh seventh and eth grade uh us living in the mid-30s percentage for proficiency and that's really something that I want want to see change maybe follow what Ela has done and and try to start pushing them past the 50% Mark uh because of that using the indicators of the espa the IR ready and classroom tests as well uh one of the things we're doing very different this year uh that we've never done at Westside middle school I know Rogers Park had uh started a year earlier than us is with flexible grouping and performance of of pretty much essenti leveling in math um you we have three different groups uh we use the I ready as the number one indicator to create these groups but we also did use the esa from the past 3 years and then there report card grades as well for those kids that sometimes fall between numbers and you can either move them up or move them down you have more than one indicator to determine that um but group one are the kids that are Le one year or less or above grade level uh in math and the second group was created with kids that were 2 to three years below grade level and the third group are students who are raer than 3 years below grade levels and hopefully creating some of this uh leveling in math uh the kids even though they they will still get instruction at their grade level it it provides some flexibility for uh direct instruction in areas that they might need um because they have holes in their find foundational learning um they could be flexibly grouped a lot easier that way I think it also allows those kids bigger opportunities to become motivated and to participate more where certain kids that are already strong at math aren't driving a lot of the discourse uh it kind of throws them up in the Forefront and and enables them to participate a lot more in those flexible groupings but hopefully this will have an impact and we'll see looking at data the next couple of years how this plays out and hopefully has a positive impact on on the math course which is what I would like to do and see is that they play out the same way they have in ela and we get above that 50% range and proficiency uh and of course we might to see those growth numbers continue to grow um some of the things we're doing and talking with the teachers whether is through PLC uh or the cpts the common planning times that teachers have is is pushing a little bit more of of explicit instruction um where you see modeling and more timely feedback given to the students based on their own work uh we want to increase vertical groupings and if you're not aware what vertical groupings are in that the kids work standing up on dry erase boards or some of those giant posters up on the wall and the kids are all around that working on problem solving that way not just sitting around a table where maybe one kid will do all the writing here they you see that marker being switched from student to student in a discourse while they're standing up it just increases and it's just a a vehicle for them to practice some of that problem solving uh in math so I like to see a little bit more of that in the classroom of course across the district I'm sure as you heard before with Mrs wanser and Mr roach uh data diven uh data driven instruction is definitely the theme that we keep pushing more trying to make it more of a cultural thing within staff making sure they're using that data uh within class classrooms within students uh to target areas of need more effectively and it's something that we've been pushing for a long time um and each year it increases more and you see a bigger acceptance across the different grade levels for different teams and the the drive and the push for that to occur is still going very very strong um and last but not least is an increased exposure to testing um um not just testing but the testing formats and platforms as teaching tools there's a lot of resources out there uh like the aibs maybe you've heard of them maybe you haven't but even the esa provides uh quizzes that you can use so to give you an example uh they could be an aib in just ratios and there 15 questions it could be an a I just on equivalent fractions 15 questions usually they're broken down the first five is the mo most simplistic next five are like the Intermediate uh type of questions and the last five are are problem solving based questions and using those tools that are already provided to be used in the classroom as teaching tools uh one example I can give you is not only do IVs Expose and gives teacher knowledge about the rigor of some of these tests they're not easy tests but it gives them exposure to the vocabulary it gives them exposure to the formatting and that's a bigger thing than sometimes we we think of and I'll give you an example I used to teach fourth grade kids would take uh equivalent fractions they would test in any quiz I would give them they would do excellent and the equivalent fractions testing quizzes whatever I gave them but when they saw it on the ASA it was a grid it was on the x axis there were four equivalent fractions on the Y AIS there were four equivalent fractions or fractions and then they had a punch or color in the dot of where the equal equivalent fractions met a lot of kids could interpret that that's what they were supposed to do but a lot of kids never saw that set up in questioning before and they were thrown even though I knew they knew their equivalent fractions so I think going through the iabs definitely takes away from some of that formatting that they wouldn't be used to seeing and um I did it gives them really good Expo exposure for what they will be facing all coming may all right so to summarize some of the things we're actions that we're taking uh at our school is definitely the first year we've leveled the math classes uh we want to use a new teacher evaluation system to identify and use more explicit instruction and the feedback we give the teachers myself and my Clark here who's will be evaluating at at lot of the teachers uh he's the assistant principal this year at Westside Middle School uh we want to in increase the use of resources such as IVs to increase exposure to the platform vocabulary and extent of rigor in problem solving and we want to continue to use the data for more effectively to more effectively identify areas of needs for individual classes and grade levels right here this shows the RC absenteeism at our school the past 3 years um up here it it looks kind of like purplish but it's really supposed to be gray that represents the state average the orange or yellow represents the district West Side Middle School is represented by the blue bars you can see we're well below the state uh average and District average uh but 3 years ago we were 8.2% last year we were 10.3 there was an increase but then we bit back down to 10.0 this is something that uh at our school we're also trying to address through our social worker uh takes the lead Miss Mrs Edward she does a lot of phone calls home visits I've done home visits with her trying to help her out hopefully we get this number down the next couple of years some of the celebration that are happening or activities at at Westside middle school because of PBIS um addressing behaviors at our school we've created new celebrations or block celebrations at our school going on at the end of every quarter uh kids at r five Westside Awards will be part of these block celebrations we call them block celebrations because they happened during the Wind Block uh e8th grade has already done theirs sixth grade has done theirs and and tomorrow 7th grade eventually does their their first black party if you get five West out of awards because of good behavior you're able to participate in those uh for the kids that didn't make them they were able to join me for a nice economic lessons on why in a big speech on why school was important we did a writing activity on where they visualize themselves when they're 25 30 years old doing what job living where what kind of car they're driving and I want them to really draw that picture for themselves um another thing we're doing is the footall tournaments uh the middle schools don't have any organized teams but last year we had our first annual footall tournament between Rogers Park bra VI and ourselves it was a huge success so this year we created 12 teams at our school and we had an in-house tournament to determine who the Champions are and they will represent us at the danburry middle school football tournament will occur sometime in April or May or or or March I believe um the theater play that we're performing this year is beauty the Beast and right now if you come to our school after schools you might hear some singing or people auditioning for different parts but that's kind of taking off the ground right now and um we're still also having conversations about maybe following up what we did with foota with some basketball programs along also Mrs Edwards played in college and professionally in Germany we're trying to explore if we could create also some sort of competition between the Middle Schools some key initiatives that are happening this year at Westside Middle School um we have a parent engagement night uh directed by Dr dimar and U Mr Dar are two counselors they had our first one just recently on cell phone and mental health uh the next one will be based uh on the theme of anxiety and the anxiety kids are facing today and then ending with uh one of the nights discussing the Freshman Academy hopefully aligning to the newmy completely coming into line uh this fall at the high school uh we have a new cell phone policy at Westside middle school which I think has been successful this year in the past you might see kids walking through the Halls holding cell phones or in their back pockets it was I I don't think I have to tell a lot of people what a huge issue cell phones are and distraction um in the past if they had them out during class they would be taken away sent to the office and at the end of the day the kids would pick them up that just was not working uh cell phones aren't they really aren't cell phones they're video recorders ERS so they take videos of each other pictures of each others their game consoles so they're playing games in there they have the entire web there to look up at assignments while they're working it is a lot more than a cell phone and of course social media platform which they could talk with each other while they're in class um since it wasn't working this year I gave them till October 1st we sent out two letters we talked about it during the open houses uh I spoke about it during orientation but this new cell phone policy was that starting October 1st if they had it out whether it was in use or not if it was in their person the only place they could be was their backpack it would be taken away and it would not be returned to them at the end of the day a parent would need to come and pick it up at the end of the day and the fact that I think um I know Mrs Harris is coming on De 4th to visit one of the things I think you will see is that you will not see cell phones out being carried or into the hallways or anywhere in the school for the most part uh we used to take probably 15 cell phones a day away and now we probably take maybe five away a week uh so it's really cut down a lot um the other thing we're doing is revamping the PBIS system you heard about the black parties at the end of each quarter uh reorganizing our tier 2 committee and reward system uh we have a 2hour delay system to that we use to start the school year so instead of starting normally we started at a 2hour delay but we dedicated the first two hours where kids would come in and teachers would go over the schedules with the students hand out computers hand out passwords and the sixth grade sixth graders got an additional tour of the scho the school uh in addition to the one they received during orientation and I think that little soft Landing of a 2hour uh class just to get them to have a soft start really helped out this year and we do the same thing with the esa testing we use a 2-hour delay system for the esa testing instead of testing them at different times throughout the day uh we dedicate 3 days for ELA one week on a 2our Del system so they come in they have a half hour warmup they test for an hour and 15 minutes and then 15 minutes to decompress and then they do the same thing the following week with math and then the rest of the day they proceed uh on their 2-hour delay schedule and I think dedicating that entire School beginning to the ASA testing has helped uh a lot with the with with the kids getting the test uh done and last but not least in collaboration we start with low and grade level Town meetings on inclusivity and explaining visible and invisible dis dis abilities basically the awareness versus acceptance of disabilities uh we had these Town M meetings uh which was led by Heather saan our school psychologist and Mrs Edwards our social worker uh they've been doing these Town Hall meetings with each grade level uh at different times throughout the day in the cafeteria so our vision for success is going to be measured through our performance in ir and ASA we want to create a culture of rigor and critical thinking based learning where students take educational risks based on timely feedback that leads to an increase in the average percentage of targets achieve and that's directly going to be tied to what we see in our performance and some of these indicators uh you know there's no way around it I tell I mean I know there's people who are for the test and against the test but if I exp before uh I don't care which profession you go into there is some test to be certified in it if you want to go into the military you're going to take the ASAT of course if you want to be a medical doctor it's going to be the mcaps even for plumbers electricians you're going to have to take the city and state hes test so there is no escaping testing and the real world you're going to have to do it to either get a degree or some sort of certification kind of we're going look at that kind of the same way it's going to be an education on something you will have to face in the future and last but not least um since we started the school year uh we wanted to start with a a good theme and and and change the culture of our school with positivity and uh with the help of Mr alop uh one of our ELA teachers in seventh grade we he put together a nice video uh where he recorded Monday through Thursday uh the first four days of school and then there was a big unveil on Friday and this on Friday all the kids in the opening class were treated to this nice video by Mr alop welcome them back to school and want to carry [Music] out I got a feeling I'm going to get better at my writing spee I got a feeling that I'm going to try to [Music] great iing I got feeling I'm [Music] going that the year is going to be a good year that the the year's going to be a good year and the year's going to be a good good year I feeling that the year's going to be a good year that the year's going to be a good year the year is going to be a good good year feeling that the year is going to be a good year the year's going to be a good year and the year's going to be a good good year W but the year going to be a good year but the year going to be all good year year is going to be all good good year when you show up I got my schu let's check it up go to your classes like first St of school let's it I know it [Music] all musle it's working over the top you bestest show you the do do it it it and do it and do it it it do it do it do it I got a feel the year's going to be a good year and the year's going to be a good year and the year's going to be a good good year I feel the year's going to be a good year and the year's going to be a good year the year's going to be a good good year today a day let's leave it up it up I got my notbook Let's It Up get it up go out and learn it learn it like you're a boss first day of school come on let's kick it [Music] off over the top do it let's do it let's do it let's do it and do it and do it and do it and do it and do it do it do it let's do it let's do it let's do it do it do it do it got easy easy now [Music] we Tuesday Wednesday and Thursday Friday Saturday Saturday sunnd with us you know what we say learn it every Lear it [Music] feel the going to be a good year and the years going to be a good year the year is going to be a good good year I'm feeling the year's going to be a good year the year's going to be a good year the year's going to be a good good Year wo one of the things you can see up there is our new signage on Westside Middle School on the top we never had before now you can identify as might that video made my my day I think it's the best video ever to send us off into the holiday break and I want to just say thank you and Mike and jeie and the whole Westside crew um you took over and a at a tough time um at the beginning of the year and in transition and you've done just a remarkable job and Mike we called you out of retirement to step up to a trust me I don't forget and uh it took you a little while to call me back the first time but then once you did I hook you you were hooked so you've been I just want to find out how you f you've been a blessing so thank you so much and jeie you're like a bedrock in the main office so um it's clear the kind of culture that you're trying to build and rebuild and just thank you very much this just a great presentation well I appreciate it and I I've said it many times I it is a lot it's a big job and but I I also know I have a lot of support and and and I feel like Danbury is a good place to have that there's a lot of people I can turn to for help which I have and I'm very grateful of that thank you I think we're going to submit that video to K next year definely it was really good good s participation the board welcomes public participation and asks that each speaker please limit their comments to 3 minutes speakers may offer objective comments of school operations and programs that concern them the board will not permit any expression of personal complaints nor defamatory comments about Board of Education personnel and students nor against any person connected with the danur public school system did anyone want to come before the board and speak to tonight no one sign the paper are you here from Chestnut yes okay we'll call you up in a sec thank you so much for being here so help public consent C motion that the Board of Education approved consent calendar as recommended and in accordance with exhibits 24-1 193 through 24-18 motion been made by oneita could I hear a second second second by Lauren any question any concerns not all in favor of the motion can I hear I oppose motion so car next we're going to have the Don just do the thing [Music] yeah we have to Deno the donation okay accept the donation of $5,000 from Emerson charitable Trust on behalf of the Branson Ultra Co to support the robotics Club in accordance with exhibit 24-1 197 a motion made I hear a second second okay motion second byone uh any questions all in favor could I getar I I oppose motion so okay okay so the next com uh accept a donation in the amount of $2,325 from Chestnut Market shell SL slash shell giving pump program to danber public school in accordance with 24198 I have made a motion could I second it Junie 2nd all in favor could I hear I I motion so car okay I'd like to introduce um amid Ramsey um from Chestnut market and amid um has runs the giving pump program and the giving pump program donates uh 3 cents for every gallon sold during the months of September and October and there's a specific giving pump and so when folks pull in that money comes directly to a beneficiary and again for the second time um we were so lucky to be the beneficiary we appreciate you so much um the location that raised the money uh for this particular check was located at 80 South Street in danburry and 445 North Main Street in danber so we thank you very much again for thinking of us in the danry public schools [Applause] okay thank you so much thank you you wait one one more [Music] thank you very much thank you than [Applause] I have to ask CU I don't want to admit anyone who have anyone for my educational sta so we move on down our student representative I'm I'm the president of our school um I'm latia C I am the B treasurer um so a couple updates from our school we had our club Fair earlier this month which basically allows students to see what the school offers all the different clubs which is really important for like freshman because they don't know what's going on in the school so they get a chance to sign up and learn more from anything they're interested in um we also have parent teacher conferences today and tomorrow um and quarter one has officially ended all our Sports have also ended except for football but they have their last game on Wednesday and our NHS induction ceremony is going to be in December for all the fall inductees who either raise their grade up um and work invited last year or Wen accepted last year and we applied and got in this year on December 12 we have the career fa for the Freshman um for those who also incoming and the ones that are not freshman for the other school that is opening up next year and then we have the P makeup for those students who aren't able to go to the U they the p where on that day uh the grades uh 10 and 11 had PS the seniors were able to go take their senior picture out of the bleachers and do their handprints on the wall and had spend time with their friends and then RC had a blood drive at the school auditorium which was a very which was very successful a lot of people attended to that students one and then on class of 19 74 had their 50th reunion and along with all four do officers and PR leadership students um they all we all went in the morning and we gave them a tour and they were really nice to meet very talkative and like very sweet people and then for the senior class they're doing an event which is like once every Friday a senior show off your go senior spirit and you have a chance to win a gift card and uh you get lesser evil popcorn did you want me to repeat what I said in the beginning or could you hear me we heard thank you thank you thank you have a great holiday too uh we're going to move down to the board standing committees uh community relations I actually do not have an update this time I'm sorry I I don't have an update time Chang since on last uh curriculum we just had a meeting Lauren we'll talk about one presentation so we just had a really great presentation um for this meeting and um we talked about the numbers that came in and um what it meant to us and going forward we're going to talk about what we're going to do um how we're going to work with those numbers but it was an amazing presentation so thank you again for that thank you finance committee Mr J asked me to let folks know that our meeting on 11:21 they should take a look at those minutes uh to get caught up on what's happening in the finance committee and then there are uh two motions that um our finance director mik Weaver can elaborate on um the next Finance meeting is on January 15th Mike did you want to have anything to add to the committee uh report names uh no just just the Motions he said just the motion we come down to policy Kate uh policy again we have no updates last SES and Sil L um our next meeting is scheduled for January 8th so we haven't had a meeting since since our last meeting okay Now we move on to action item action item a Kate I'll make a motion of the Board of Education approve the October 2024 financial report which includes the 2425 uh Alliance budget allocations as recommended by the finance committee and in accordance with exhibit 24-1 199 motion made by Kate could I hear a second second Teresa and a question I'm sorry yeah no problem that any question concerning financial report see none Mike no all in favor of the motion could I hear I I oppos motion so car Michelle action item B withdrawal of the reserve draw down request motion that the Board of Education approved the withdrawal of the 71923 request to the city council to seek a reserve draw down in the amount of 3,448 in conjunction with the 2023 24 operating budget as recommended by the finance committee and in accordance with 24-20 motion made by Michelle second second by K any questions any discussion M no okay all those in favor could I hear I I motion oppose anyone oppos okay motion so car policy Teresa C policy 31711 d nonlinguistic 24-21 motion made by Teresa can I hear second second I hear three seconds wow motion made by Teresa second by any question concerning the motion seeing none all in favor could I hear I motion so car okay didn't have any superintendent's report okay um so I wanted to just give a brief update on on a group that's been doing some amazing work out um with their club and that is our our DHS robotics Club um every couple of Saturdays Eric soyi takes his team out and heads to different parts of the state and they absolutely mop up the competitions and do a phenomenal job our students have been winning Awards left and right um placing um in various um spots in the competition they have recently won Design Awards and then one of the most coveted awards at these competitions at the Award of Excellence for some of our teams and they continue to progress last year they went to the world Vex robotics competition in Dallas um and so we found ways to fund them through um through some grants to make sure that they had the transportation that they need to go out to make sure that they have the materials that they need to um build the robots and repair the robots and they've just been an amazingly collaborative group um when I've gone on to visit S Dy high school I'll pass by Eric sh always step in to say hello to see how the kids are doing and whether or not he has a class or not there's always about a group of at least five or six sometimes 10 or more kids on their lunch break on their period off the teachers in there on their prep period and they are just building and testing and getting ready so these kids are committed before school they go down there after school they go down there um and just a program that's really growing um and we attribute that to sort of the developing interest in stem but also kind of funding and aligning our resources to make sure that the kids have everything they need as well as the teacher to make sure that that that club is successful so I just wanted to point that out because he he he makes such a great uh effort to email every time they go to a competition with details and uh they're really it's a really successful uh vure so I just wanted to share that at the board level um we had our presentation tonight on nextg accountability system results thank you very much Mr Ro is still here um you know if you've noticed over the past uh couple of sessions we're really trying to focus in on that data piece and making sure that everybody is um present and and in tune to the Improvement efforts that we're trying to it's still here um and so that we had that presentation today the next curriculum meeting will have the and what are we doing about it meeting so the first one was the education on the accountability understanding it this presentation today was how that app to our numbers that just came in and then we'll do a deep dive into sort of the system Improvement efforts um which is really important to kind of get the the system as a whole to improve um even as we're in the face of you know Staffing shortages like how are we still trying to keep all laser like focus on that prize of student achievement closing our gaps so again thank you very much much Mr Ro um I'll come back to the code of conduct in a second um we need substitutes we need substitutes um this is an all call if for folks at home if you are looking for a few extra dollars you want to get out of the house a couple days a week um if you have a neighbor you maybe your child's in graduate school and they home for break um whatever the cas is we need substitutes we are in Desperate shape to fill our ranks um as we head into the winter months with cold and flu season especially um Mondays and Fridays tend to be difficult so we could really use um special staff to bolster our ranks um all of our teachers are covered for one another internally and it's uh creating a great stress uh in the work that they have to do so if you have a friend or a neighbor please spread the word they can go on to our website and look for the Kelly Services logo and QR code and can sign up um and uh we hope that we can get um some more subs over the next month especially okay uh code of conduct we've had a slight uptick in some of our student behaviors that seeing um occasionally from time to time we find ourselves having to um you know discipline some students who make some mistakes um sometimes they're silly mistakes sometimes they're very serious mistakes and um it's always comes it's always a sad event when you have to have a relatively decent kid get into trouble and miss school or get expelled or um you know miss out on part of their education because they've made some mistakes that fall out of line with our student the code of conduct and so we're asking parents to review the code of conduct we have code of conduct for the different levels in the school system depending on students age but to make sure that you're having conversations with your child at home um to review the expectations and to also attend some of the school events at night and conferences that are going on now and to be kind of queuing into some of the things that the schools are seeing that they're uh trying to squash at the school level in terms of the so um we're Partners in nwor and we hope that when we come back from the Break um we see some improved behaviors uh amongst the schools and that some of the uh silliness from the beginning of the year um starts to fall down so we can get get to back to business but please review those codes of conduct because they sometimes come to to haunt us when students make mistakes okay um DHS career fair I sent an email out over the weekend hopefully some folks have seed it we are looking for uh professionals entrepreneurs business owners to help uh help launch some of our career fair initiatives we have about 30 or so folks booked for December 12th we're looking for more folks involved in stem we have a lot of uh Human Service field so we're good there but we need more hard technical science architecture business finance Computer Engineering um so if you know of anybody in those fields who might be willing to come and uh stay at a booth for a couple hours and engage with our students um please put them in contact with even myself or Mike ceeling and we'll get them hooked up in at our Curr fair and the last is um ases Thanksgiving and I'm sure our board members have already got the gotten the invitation but um as part of our danur tradition always um Ace invites the community for their annual Ace Thanksgiving feast it's Tuesday November 26 from 10:30 to 12:30 and it's 26 loope Avenue and it has become a huge part of my tradition here and so I hope to see you all all there on that day and in my party words I will just in reflection of the Thanksgiving season uh I want to thank the board members for um their contributions this year um as we head into another budget season um there's always um you know kind of a spirit in the air as we have to collaborate and work through some difficult things uh and I appreciate the partnership that we developed I'm also very thankful for our teachers and our administrators and our par professionals and our support staff in the schools right now who are covering for their colleagues who are going the extra mile to make sure that um education continues with the least amount of disruption um it's been a tough run because of the Staffing that we mentioned earlier um the Improvement efforts that that we've seen um while we would love to see more um there are there are improvements happening in the district and that happens on the backs of people working you hard in the schools and so um just to say that we are all thankful for that thankful for the team here at central office who are helping to support um the buildings right now as possible my final words than everybody board chairperson report not so much a report just to say I think we this board has did an awesome job together this year working together we hir an in superintendent then we went through the process and we hired a superintendent uh we went through the process and we worked both sides together and I hope as we move forward that we continue the relationships and the attitude and working together because we can't get anything done uh for this District if we are working against one another so I hope we continue to move forward in a positive way um I want don't I want to thank too far down because we have an our annual um dinner next week I hope that before people myself including uh Teresa Kate and Wanita that attended the convention that you will bring back a full report in January okay so you write write your notes write your notes down and take and keep them until January okay and uh you know you guys got those papers in your book got the bag so you got all the stuff don't have to give up just some of the workshops that we attended and what came out of those Workshop because those Workshop was important and um the presentations were beautiful and we even enter a new part of the convention that we have never entered where you know Teresa had her little fan voting and catch F voting and it was something to for us to not just pay our money to be a part of C we had actual voices there speaking on thee so with that you know I'm just looking forward to continue to work with us I I want to thank that everyone have a safe and Happy Thanksgiving and when we when you out talking you ask some question and people are asking questions about the danur school system I hope that is positive because you might say something positive and someone else turns around and make it negative and we want our school system to be the best that there is in the state so with that anyone that did not see me for Christmas uh Little T Tilly tally see me before you go see me before you go okay just want to ask uh next week is that just uh uh dinner or is it the meeting we got we have it's annual election oh election it's election of our officer and it starts at 6 that starts at 6 okay we're going to take pictures at 6 the entire group and then we're going to go into a meeting and then we're going to celebrate Christmas without dinner all right I'm trying to be here on time we know it was a traffic hang up to today but you know we're going to try to start in time okay and I need a motion to make a motion to a Jour okay all favor by
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
and then they're getting up at 7: and then they're cranky all day gee no wonder we're not performing at a high level so if we can kind of help curb this just a little bit by this pilot program my goal is to come back sometime in March April May somewhere in there before the end of the school year and maybe we make this a mandatory policy right now we're going to take a make it a pilot program let's see what we see and and work with our administrators so any questions we're not asking for board action on this as much as an informational piece any questions or concerns as we um do this pilot program within that are you the teachers conveying it to the students that you know the ones that procrastinate until whatever time you know go home and screw off all night and then decide to do homework at 10 10:00 that's been one of the biggest complaints we get from the principles uh mainly K through five no disrespect towards secondary but K through five the principles are being bombarded by a lot of um these alerts that go off so since we implemented a different content filtering system uh starting at about 11-ish principles don't want to get interrupted by that stuff but invariably kids are doing some dangerous things at those times um just a few weeks ago I don't I can't go into any details but we've had some elementary kids starting having having email conversations with people they shouldn't have well a few days ago we turned off the internet for those kids right for all the students and so we're trying to help curb that also um so there's some underlying problems there that we're just now starting to let's see how we can unfold that onion or how can we you know Assist them in the classroom so yeah there there we have gotten a lot of feedback from the teachers to answer question but are you convey who's conveying it to the kids I mean are you sending home letters yes my apologies my apologies we do have a letter that will be sent out via parent Square uh tomorrow um probably tomorrow morning is working with Kenny my apologies yeah so yeah now the letter that you have in your board packet will be what will be sent out in parent Square tomorrow correct so you talked about it but could you expand upon what the change was related to email that you just kind of briefly can you just kind of go over that a little bit more and explain what what the change in the student email and they can't receive yeah sure so one of the problems that we've been having is um in working with uh some of our kids there's some situations where students uh start emailing adults outside the corporation and that's created a real problem and um and and not in a sense that they can't you know we want them to email cleanly but right now there's a lot of issues that we've been having with um students and some adults trying to take advantage of our young kids and frankly we're here to protect our kids and so for right now we're turning off that email case through 11 um and working with Pat mcglauflin there's a few 11th graders that need email you know to send for colleges or you know uh grants or whatever they're looking for and of course seniors are trying to get into college so those guys this all seniors will have full email send receive but K through 11 we are we're we're just not allowing that to happen for right now so thank you any other comments questions thank you Mike appreciate you thank you all right well now move to item E2 statement of work in joint program between vinin University and hnhs board I uh have principal Tiffany Drummond is here tonight to discuss this uh this was brought to you earlier vinin has made a modest change and I'll let her go through that for you tonight good evening uh this is the same document that you approved in October the only change is they extended it an additional year so that it'll be good for two years so I see that as the benefit because we won't do this next year and it locks in that discounted rate for our CT students as well so Tiffany we just approved this one year last month I believe and so there is re truly nothing else different in this agreement other than the second year being added on correct just a date change so I board I wanted you to be aware of that for whatever reason they sent us the one for one year and we approved it and they turned right around and sent us for the second year so that's that's the only change on this document okay uh would anyone like to make a motion regarding the proposed agreement with vinss make a motion that we approve the statement of work and Joint uh program statements for 2024 through 2026 between vincen University and huny County Community Schools is there a second second any additional questions or comments all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve thank you Tiffany appreciate you thank you all right motion passes 6 to zero we will now go to E3 girls flag football board uh I'm honored tonight to bring athletic director Jeremy Markham and Andy Mattis senior manager of football development for the Indianapolis Colts to bring forward a proposal for girls flag football so thank you for being here tonight gentlemen thank you I'm going to turn this over to Andy uh so that he can give you some basic background information on girls flag football and uh so he'll talk about some of what's been going on in the state of Indiana and the partnership with the ihsa and the Indianapolis Colts with this and Coach Markham uh this is uh for consideration to begin next school year is that uh on yeah our intent would be to start this as a club sport in the fall of 2025 uh it is a fall sport uh for female athletes um and that would be our intent uh to do it at that time excellent thank you Andy thanks for being here tonight absolutely thanks for having me um I did prepare a presentation that I can share with you guys on girls flag football what the league is doing what the Colts are doing to help grow this throughout our state give me two give me three why are you here [Music] so as you can see with that video there's a lot of excitement around the sport um we've seen a ton of growth over the last three years with what we've been able to put into girls flag and the schools that are participating um I'd like to start out with why invest in girls flag football and have a brief video my favorite part about flag is throwing a ball and playing with my teammates um probably being able to work together definitely scoring helping my team score the competitiveness probably the friendships that I build being able to play football without being like criticized as a girl I just love the sport in general being able to go out on the field feel that adrenaline rush through you as you're catching the ball or throwing the ball or pulling somebody's flag on defense it's always something new my favorite part is experiencing the game with my team and being able to make bonds with them and have fun feeling like powerful because like you know football is normally called like a boy sport but now it's like for all girls and like we can be United and like everybody is like very welcoming and nobody judges you because it's everybody's first time so it's just fun in a very loving Community how competitive it is in being able to play football my favorite part about flag is meeting new people and going against other teams winning it's winning and having [Music] fun so as you can see right there there's a lot of excitement and interest from the girls in our state to play flag football football um those were representatives from our 27 schools that participated this past fall um we were able to bring them out to training camp and have a media day with them as they also packed flag kits to send back to the middle schools that feed to their high schools so why girls flag football the opportunities are growing uh flag football growth in general is a huge push from the NFL um to continue to grow it it's one of the fastest growing Sports in the country with flag football and you're seeing a lot of that on the Youth Level and a lot of the driver with that participation is female participation um with football you just naturally think of boys tackle Friday nights Saturday with college Sunday with the NFL but now there's this opportunity for girls to have their own path through the sport of football and play at an elite level from the Youth Level all the way to it will be in the 2028 Olympics um there are over 20 schools now um collegiately that offer girls flag so the opportunities are continuing to grow and as the Colts we want to bridge that with the high school effort and continue to support high schools that are looking to on board it I'll be brief with these next slides as you can see this is the landscape of high school girls flag throughout the country this was as of August 2024 since then Pennsylvania has now become a sanctioned state so we have 13 states in the country that now have this sanctioned as a Varsity Sport collegiately it's continuing to grow um I would be shocked from my conversations if it's not an emerging sport on the NCAA level in the next three to four years before the 2028 Olympics and now my favorite slides the Colts commitment to high school girls flag and how we can help you guys on board this our objectives as we do with all tackle we want to support the growth of football but specifically girls flag we want to increase interest and then our ultimate goal is to have this as a varsity sanctioned sport in the state of Indiana the Colts commitment um I'm not sure if everyone was tuned in to the game yesterday or the broadcast or that um that was posted afterward but we announced the ersay family has graciously committed a million dollars to the growth of girls flag over the next few years um a lot of this goes directly to the schools we want to lower barriers um to create this opportunity for the schools and know that budgets can be a hanging Point as well too so for the next with within that commitment for the next 75 schools that commit to participating in the fall of 2025 you'll receive a package valued at $10,000 of support that will be two different fin Financial grants to your school year one will be 5,000 year two will be, 1500 that can cover head coach stiens facility fees Transportation officials fees anything you incur with the sport of girls flag football um we will assist with covering jerseys as well we've worked with Nike and gear up to cover 25 tops and 25 bottoms for your team if there's any hang up with it being Nike then we can visit a voucher for you guys too to cover those jerseys and then we'll provide a USA football equipment kit with comes with cones pylons everything you need for both a practice and a game perspective and then each head coach will receive a USA football coaching membership so if they've never coached before or new to flag this has online resources of practice planning game planning drills anything you need as a new head coach just a brief landscape of where we're at with the state we started back in 2022 with a jambur five different school districts and over a hundred girls showed up to that we built off that momentum had eight teams participating in our pilot league in 2022 or 2023 I'm sorry and in 2024 this past fall we had 27 schools participating with five schools in Fort Wayne being a part of that as well um so there are some schools in the area participating in girls flag now rules I won't spend too much time on this unless there's any specific questions um nfhs will unveil their National governing set of rules in the spring of 2025 and we'll be prepared to um engage officials train officials so that we'll be ready for the fall of 2025 just going to how we structure in Indiana as well up until this point the Colts have been the commissioners of the league we've scheduled we've assigned officials we've rescheduled we've done all of that in 2025 with the hopeful growth to 100 schools that will be put into the schools with a framework of this is the season this is how many games you're expected to hit but it will be on the schools to schedule the games but we'll have a pool of officials as well as contacts that you can reach out to the schedule of those games and then these are just our next steps right now would love for you to pull on interest within the community if there's girls that are interested in participating um and then we do have a commitment form that I'll share with Coach Markham and then we uh once that's filled out we'll get the ball rolling on all of your support as well as we plan for the fall of 2025 all right thank you uh does anyone have any questions all right would anyone like to make a motion regarding the proposal to add girls flag football I'll make a motion that we approve the proposal to add girls flag football for the 2526 school year is there a second second any questions or comments before we vote so question um where are you plan on playing I see the the field makeup is different than normal football field and I didn't know how you were going to readjust that yeah we've provided Porta Fields as well too so the field is 100 yards by 40 yards roughly that is from the boundary to the opposite hash so you can run cones down there that's how we've done it we'll provide a packet to all athletic directors and administrators as well on how to set up the field but you'll receive enough cones through that USA football equipment to do that as well but we'll also come up with a uh design for your ground crew if if you guys wish to paint the lines as well so at this time you're looking at the football field yeah we would look to utilize um either the grass practice field as a as an area as well that could be utilized for practice Andor competition but we would try to play it on the the main turf field for any competitions that we would have for sure um so yes just working through all those schedules um we do know that uh five Fort Wayne Community Schools do did field teams last year uh so those would be uh fairly close opponents uh South Ben has some schools as well and I know there's some talk with other local schools that currently do not have it but are investigating as we are at this time as well so I do see it uh continuing to grow um and and they request a minimum number of at least 10 um to 25 uh girls we did did do I did do a survey in the fall um sent it out via email to all of our 9th through 11th grade females uh we only had 52 replying I know email is not always the best way to do that but 37 indicated they had an interest in girls flag football of those 52 um so I I think the interest will be there um to get this thing going and and I I've got some ideas on coaches and those type of things as well so I think it could be a really positive thing and another opportunity uh for some student athletes to to participate in something maybe they wouldn't consider um and if we can get enough schools in the state it will become an emerging sport with the ihsa down the road just as girls wrestling and boys volleyball has and then eventually is now sanctioned so so when you get too many for one team is your hopes to have a JV and a varsity team um if if we could get with other school schools that they would have enough players to do that maybe we could play an extra quarter or something to accommodate those student athletes if we had large numbers yeah that would be an option and sorry to jump in on those last two questions we are up for voting to be an emerging sport in the spring of 2025 we're very hopeful will get deemed as an emerging sport as well as um we will pull all schools on if they wish to make two teams or have some additional competition so that if there are any schools in your area and you'd like to have more than 25 we'll work around having that opportunity as well all right any additional questions right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve the recommendation I appreciate you coming up tonight um to share this with you I'm personally very excited about this opportunity for our girls and Jeremy thank you for your willingness to lead this through through this too so um this this is going to be fun this this will be great for our kids so thank you yeah and motion passes six to zero so thank you all right we'll now move on to the consent agenda F1 through1 yes in I have a few items I want to discuss with you here at this point in time uh the first one is um F5 where we have uh two job descriptions for your consideration as you saw by the flowchart uh earlier this evening we mentioned to you the Director of Finance um this position uh what I'll be recommending in the Personnel report is moving our Deputy treasur Tyler hascal from uh the deputy treasur into this position of Director of Finance um when doing this um and helping us with this uh workflow will also notice some changes some minor changes in the corporation Treasurer uh job description that will also happen uh moving on to the Personnel report on F6 uh Mr Peters would you like to talk about a retirement that we have there yes in the Personnel report uh you will see that Amy Rudolph has submitted her letter of retirement and so uh we wish Amy well uh she came to The District in 2006 as the principal at Forest man was there for 5 years uh until the building was was closed to turn into central office she's been at Andrews for 19 years um total 35 years uh she's looking forward to spending more time with her parents and her two adorable grandchildren and the neat part about this is she she can't wait to come back as a guest teacher and and join our uh substitute rank as a guest teacher and so we're so pleased so uh it's not goodbye um and so we wish her well and she has served with this distinction and was worth uh noting here uh this evening in our board meeting also um want to draw your attention in the Personnel report to the nurse and Clinic assignments um before I went on leave in June I was working uh on these adjustments uh to complete our uh contracts for this past year um I did not get back until uh July and then school started with a variety of other pieces I have since been working on this the past month and so I have uh those nurse and Clinic assignments uh adjustments um for your uh consideration also in there I want to draw a attention to the business administration additional duty stiens that we have um I cannot say thank you it's enough for this group of professionals that since August have jumped in and helped me out uh daily um being short staffed in our business department actually being down three uh employees and um I'm grateful for this team I'm grateful for what they have done um I also appreciate the support of Mrs Smith who has helped me get this as cost almost as cost neutral as we can um with the departure of our CFO and a couple of other um employees out of that department but I will tell you without the commitment of this group um we would not have get done what we have gotten done up to this U point in time and so I just want to say um thank you for that entire team and for their willingness and support there has been many many long hours additional hours that have been spent and they have done this uh quietly behind the scenes and for that I am um truly truly um grateful you'll notice uh the appointment of assignments I've previously mentioned uh Tyler hascal with the Director of Finance also um a technical change is Rihanna Jennings was our only director or was our only employee serving in that role who was not a director and so I have uh made those changes in there also and so um that is that part there F7 is the substitute handbook teacher handbook that we discussed at length at the last work session I am seeking your approval there have been no changes since that work session and so I'm just seeking your approval of that peace also um the um General County local retention schedule update um Mrs Gray and Mrs hippen steel are a vital uh part of making sure sure that we follow all these rules and regulations in these areas um we are working diligently to make sure these are followed especially as we move to digital and so many of these uh paper records so asking your approval for that tonight I'm also uh recommending for your approval $85,900 [Music] um there are nine of those um the largest one of those is coming robotics for autism Grant which we were awarded by the idoe uh in in excess of $65,500 for our specialed students um we continue to be very aggressive uh with our grant writing and those possibilities um I don't want to uh short Change anyone else who has been so gracious in that but I do want to do that and then we have the accounts payable uh payroll voucher register so I'm seeking your permission of all the consent agenda listed f one through1 right thank you Mr trout uh would anyone like to make a motion regarding the consent agenda motion to approve the consent agenda is presented is there a second second uh before we vote does anyone want to pull out a particular numbered item and vote on it separate from the rest okay uh before we vote does anyone have any questions or discussion all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve the consent agenda items F1 through 10 for all right motion passes 6 to zero we now go to G1 Financial reports for October 2024 good evening president Roth superintendent trout members of the board I bring to you this evening the October 2024 um financial statements for for review here and we'll start out of course with um customary with our education fund and this you'll see um the budget order that was approved at the beginning of 2024 under the green column then you'll see the amount for October for the current um budget month that we're um displaying and then our year-to-date amount for our education fund and you'll see over on the right hand side um all our uh charts that represent the these numbers that are on um the left and then right below the charts uh you'll see the summary number numers and you'll see that we're approximately 83 and a half% through the year we have um two more months left of this uh budget year these major funds are budgeted from January through December and um you'll see we've received approximately 81% of our Revenue now remember for this Revenue our main Revenue that we receive is through our twish and support our basic Grant and um in November they will Shore up our numbers um based on the estimates that were provided at the beginning of the year and then our actual ADM count average daily membership um as it was finalized in October then they adjust those numbers and um for instance if your District goes down in ADM of course then they adjust those numbers backwards and reduce your payment in November if your District um increases in ADM then you receive um that that difference uh shorted up in no November and of course with uh Huntington we did uh increase in our enrollment and especially based on our uh projections that we had so we're um pleased to report that so you'll see that increase in our Revenue come um when we display our November uh revenue for the education fund and then we're right on target with our um balance uh for our um fund balance for this fund and um moving on to our next fund we have our Debt Service fund and this one has no activity for October in a reminder that this fund is received the revenues received by property taxes and those taxes come in uh the majority of those taxes come in in um June and December and then the payments for those amortization schedules for all their bonds and leases are made also in June and December so that is why you see no um action um for the month of October next you'll see our our other major fund um our operations fund and same as our education fund it has the same um information on there and when you go down to our um summaries you'll see that we're about um 55% of our Revenue that has been received and two just like our um Debt Service fund this is a property tax fund so the majority of this Revenue comes in June and December so you'll see that short up by the end of the year and we're right on target with our expenditure and you'll see that about 63 just a little under 64% so we're well in enough um room for our um budget compared to our expenditures and right on target for this fund next you'll see our rainy day fund and you'll see a little bit spent on of that and that is um the appropriation that was given at the beginning of the year for the main uh office renovation for the ad Administration office central office and um you'll see that uh a little over $22,000 that was spent this month so we're right on target with those um expenditures and that appropriation if we do have anything that is um not been paid by the end of the year of course we'll encumber those Monies to equal our um 1.5 million um that maybe uh might be paid like in 2025 but have already been um processed or uh scheduled to be performed for uh the central office so you will see those numbers Shore up at our year end presentation that we do in January and February and then next um you will see our food service fund this is the one that's a little different where this is a fiscal year fund so this runs July 1 to June 30th so you'll see those fiscal um numbers there for the month and then for the fiscal year to date and we also are right on target for this fund and our food service director and his team has been doing a great job of um um watching their expenditures and making sure that they balance their expenditures and their revenue each month and last but not least you'll see our curriculum materials fund and um this is um our old textbook rental fund so you'll see some information you'll see some activity in there from um when students uh maybe have lost a book or damaged um any kind of uh equipment or devices that's the revenue that comes in for that of course we do not charge for regular textbook rental but if there is um damage that we're able to by law to um to uh charge for those so you'll see that information in there and then a little bit of expenditures a reminder that in January this fund will roll into our education fund however we will split this out um for you for the revenue and the expenditures so we'll be able to track that we have a new um chart of accounts just for the curricular materials and make sure that we communicate that and keep that separate in our education fund and then that is it for the regular um materials I don't know if we were going to go through the comparisons if not we don't have to it's up to you if you have it on the screen we can go ahead and go through those and then this is the other type of uh financial report that we do this is the operations fund and we put this together just to show the trends over um I think it's now six years of Trends so um the board and the public can see each month how it compares to the years before the current year so if you go um to the second page I think it is um where we highlight the month that we're reporting which is October so you'll see there at the bottom in the green that's highlighted for the month that we're reporting um the differences between um each of the Octobers from year to year the revenue the year-to-date Revenue the year-to-date expenditures and then the cash balances for that we also have the same um format for our education fund so we do it for our two main funds so if you go down Cindy to that second page for October you'll see the differences in the comparisons for October of 24 versus the last um five years so um we're right on target with um what we have projected through our cash flow analysis and um all that that we've presented to the board and done through our budget so we're right on target with both These funds along with the historical comparisons that we um compared them to I would be happy to answer any questions the board may have at this time regarding the um October financials all right there being no questions I'll entertain a motion to approve the October 2024 Financial reports than motion we approve the uh October 2024 Financial reports as presented is there a second second any questions now hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve Mrs Smith thank you uh we're are continued to be blessed with your supports and your leadership and your help and I'm grateful for you every day so thank you appreciate you we agree with that thank thank you thank you all right motion passes 6 to zero and I'll go to G2 District Insurance renewal it's that time of year uh where I'm recommending for your approval uh the enclosed uh proposal uh from Mr metler uh with the insurance for the upcoming school year there is a variety of information uh to you there uh for EUR perusal with that um I will tell you beginning in in the winter spring of 25 we will begin the process of taking this out for an RFP uh for next fall so I want to make you aware of that um for the public we're looking at a 13.7% increase over the year before um within that too and so um I'm just recommending your approval uh for this uh Insurance proposal all right thank you Mr trout uh would anyone like to make a motion regarding the proposed Insurance re Insurance renewal motion to approve the district Insurance renewal for 2025 as presented is there a second second any questions comments or discussion before we vote all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve the renewal motion passes 6 to zero we now move to H1 contract with green for Life board uh I'm honored to have Rich hurdle director of custodians and maintenance for Huntington County Community Schools here tonight uh he'll have we have a recommendation for number one and number two but we'll cover number one now for recycling and trash pickup I believe this is 2025 through 28 correct Mr hurdle I know that board you have the uh do uh documents and the pricing and so on so rich is here uh number one for recommendation number two to answer any questions you might have if any excuse me anyone have any questions no okay I'll go ahead and entertain a motion to approve the contract with green for life as presented motion to approve green for Life contract for 202528 as presented is there a second second are there any questions comments or discussion before we vote all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve okay all right motion passes six to zero now move on to item H2 new admin office fencing um board uh for your consideration tonight and approval uh new Administration Administrative Office fencing and uh fence row cleanup Mr hurdle could uh you tell us a little bit about the process the recommendation permits and those sort of things very similar to what we did out here along the stadium um taking out the olden dot fence that's falling apart um cleaning up the fence row and putting new black fence to match like we did out here at the stadium and the recommendation is with Amore I believe Amore and Indiana fence yeah very good Amore and Indiana fence and so we have just like we did with the uh football stadium we have worked with IND do corre uh through this it's been properly permitted correct and all of those pieces so um in case you were asked we have uh been through that entire process then I believe all that information is in your packet yeah and it's it's in your board packet there okay would anyone like to make a motion regarding the proposal for new fencing at the admin office motion to approve the new Administration office fencing as presented is there a second second any questions comments or discussion Clarity will this come out of the 1.5 from the reading Dev hunt or is this somewhere else no so let's talk about that Becky about uh the payment of that um within what what we have with that I want to make sure we clarified that with you this evening with that so um you want to comment on that sure this would be through our regular operations fund we have plenty appropriation and light item for this for this um purchase any other questions thank you all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve motion passes 51 we'll now go to H3 naming of new admin office yes um Rich timelines for that completion of that I'm sorry I was going to ask you that during the questions of the previous on the fencing and cleanup do you have a time appropriate approx okay that's what I want to make sure okay um on uh H3 with the naming of the new administrative office um we have given you a variety of options there for your consideration uh our recommendation uh for you because we are reaching the time where this decision uh helps us move a lot of other processes along so our recommendation uh for the new administ for the new Administration office is the hunting County Community Schools administrative Center so that's what we're recommending for your approval all right any questions comments or discussion about naming of the new Administrative Office all right does anyone I don't have to work there that's y'all so I'm going to go with what you want does anyone have a motion they would like to make regarding the recommendation make a motion to approve hunting Huntington County Community School's administrative Center as presented for the new name for the building is there a second second all right any questions comments or discussion now so since uh we took a letter off I assume that you're working towards yes we'll bring that to you on on uh December the 16th is our plan uh to bring all of The Branding pieces to you at that time any other questions all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve hccs administrative Center as the name for the new admin office all right motion passes six to zero we'll now go to H4 town of Warren agreement to purchase real estate yes we've asked Mr Joe Wy uh School Board attorney uh to present to you uh some of the important details of this agreement uh with the town of waren Mr Wy thank you this has been a journey uh my earliest note on this was July of 22 when uh Mr trout and Mr War pup uh came to my office I think in Huntington and we started to discuss the option of selling off Parcels of the real estate at Salomon School the map that you see is is not the greatest map in the world I'll admit but this was prepared by the surveyor Joel H Joe herendine of sour surveys sour engineering um you can see obviously where the school is the the the track and the grass area the line that they are proposing cendy run marker move your marker up to the top left of the woods right there it goes across the woods then down to there's a a Waterway it goes past that into a field that's has been farmed then to the west to where 12th Street intersects then back up towards the creek and then kind of parallel with the creek to State Road five and then back to aign right there now this is all the footprint of this has all been uh cooperatively uh developed with the town of Warren and uh on site Mrs kitchen but also our Administration team um we entered into a letter of intent with the town and we are now at the point that uh the town of Warren has approved the contract and it's coming to this board to approve the contract I want to go through I need to go through a few points on the contract so we are all on the same page of this this is a transfer or a sale between Indiana Municipal corporations between the town of waren between the hunting County and Community School Corporation that exempts this whole process from other procedures when we have um either sold property and it's even on the acquiring of property of appraisals when it's when it's municipality the municipality some of the steps are dispensed with and the reasoning is that it's taxpayers to taxpayers and so uh some of the protections we're we're trying to protect the taxpayers on both sides um this board passed a resolution in the fall of 22 to declare this as excess property meaning that it is no longer needed for school purposes uh we have been renting the Farmland uh Colin suiki has been farming it and doing a nice job with that uh but it wasn't being used for school school and educational purposes as I said back in July of 22 uh Marilyn Morrison town clerk made contact with I think Brian and and and do Mr trout and for the idea of turning the Barr area into a hous into housing um this was received as a win-win for both municipalities for the town of Warren housing is a a need uh housing's a need in all of Huntington County but particularly in Warren in median housing was a was a great need uh for the school corporation as as Mrs Smith points out to us our ADM our count um is so important because that's how we're funded if we can add however many houses in this area this demographers will tell you a certain percentage of them will have school AG children and for each child that comes into the corporation that's about $7,000 into our into our general fund correct uh more or less um we gave a presentation boy I think maybe last spring when Mr trout Mrs Smith presented to you how if we put this on the open market yes we might have received a larger price per acre but we would lose the control over how what how we were going to sell this and the restrictions we were going to put on this the money that will come in through tax real estate taxes and a uh ad the attendance for the children more than makes up for any uh perceived loss of value in outright selling the property uh go to the survey the survey is is in the uh performance stage it is not finalized yet um our original letter of intent um and I know that's very very hard to see but there are two Parcels that are indicated one is 20.6 67 acres and the second one is 34123 Acres that our original letter of intent indicated we'd be uh selling 55 acres to the town of Warren this survey the Prof for is 54.79 so the estimates on where we were going to put the line are are pretty close at that number uh the agreed price was $2,500 an acre that would if that number holds in the final draft to the survey that will be a sale price of $136,900 [Music] contract and there's a time there's timelines uh regarding once it's approved here as far as uh because this becomes the effective date uh finishing the survey Title Insurance any objections inspections and all those types of things uh we are selling this as is where is meaning that U we are not going to be called on to correct any defects now there's no there are no improvements on the land but even if we a tile is discovered to be broken down we are under no obligation to fix that the town of Warren is purchasing the property as is probably the most important part I think from our side of the table is that there is a three-year restriction from the date of closing for Warren to commence site development work excavation on all part of the real estate for developing this aim into single family residential development if that does not occur within that three-year period the school will school corporation can buy the property back at the same $2,500 per acre there's language that it is single family residential no multifam residential nor any other residential purpose there was negotiation back and forth between the town and the school regarding other possible uses and um this board's intent was clear that this entire conveyance was to be for single family uh houses only also each house must have at least 12200 square feet uh for a one-story house no less than 750 square feet for a two-story unit and must have a two-car garage there must be a cement and driveway and 20 ft in width uh it must be landscape with a minimum of 10 shrubs two trees and one tree in the front yard uh no structures of a temporary character can be on the property there's to be a concrete public sidewalk that adjoins uh the houses and I'm sure at some point would include a sidewalk over to the school it has to be 5 feet in width uh the front elevation May consist of vinyl sighting and at least 75 square fet of Brickstone or similar Masonry Products so you can see I mean there's we're trying to have nice houses but these are not high-end uh highest end houses in Huntington County they're meant to be family homes they're meant to be uh homes that uh people can raise their kids and send them to school and uh we all can benefit from that um there's a there's a provision for this all has to go through the uh local Department of Community Development Cindy go back to the first map um currently this is in two Parcels the don't match these two descriptions there is one description that's basically the building the old football field years ago uh and part of the woods and then there's a second 54 acre parcel that was woods and kind of wraps around all the way to the front uh part of the the school there past uh uh the Dogwood Villas so we're we're creating two new parcels out of two Parcels but until we complete this process they don't match up so that all has to go through Department of Community Development and they will approve the new survey of selling off of the description to the town of Warren um as I said the next step on the other side of the table is that uh town of Warren has the right to sell assign or transfer uh the parcels to a third party developer um as long as they are bound by the same restrictions and obligations that have already been cited so what all of these restrictions that we've put in the contract will follow uh the sale to the town of Warren again the the tonight if approved will will set motion of timeline I can't give you an exact estimate uh as when exact closing will occur but it will it should be uh yet this year I think or first of the year uh one last point that it's a very important point we put in that from our side that this will not will not be a tiff District uh early on there was some discussion about how having a seat on a a tiff District table but um our opinion was that we would not benefit from that because one of the reasons we want this is to increase the cess valuation and if we then Tiff the um taxes we're kind of working against ourselves so and that survives closing too and is binding on the the the town and the developers so um the the real estate will not not ever become a tiff a tiff District that's broad broad broad overview um the next step is for you to approve the contract excuse me and then have Mr mclen and Mr Roth um to sign it if it's if it's approved and then it says we'll go from there questions all right would anyone like to make a motion regarding the proposed agreement with the town of Warren I'll make a motion that we approve the proposed agreement with the town of Warren is there a second second any questions or discussion now before we vote just want to thank Mr trout and Mr Wy for their continued work on moving this forward it's uh as Mr Wy so put it it's been a while um um quick question do we know if we Salamon will still be able to use the woods for educational purposes yes when we've been in negotiations with the town of waren um we've been having those discussions and we've been reassured that that would be the case um I think their intention is is to tie it into the trails you with the rest of the town and the benefit to our kids being involved with that our students being involved with that our staff is quite obvious and so um we've received assurances of that any other questions all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve the agreement I just want to say thank you Joe for your help uh through this um it's been invaluable I'm grateful for your direction and all of this so thank you right motion passes 5 Z with one abstention we'll now go to H5 Award of bid for h&hs PA system board uh U and Mr trout Terry thury was unable to be here tonight so I am going to read his recommendation uh his recommendation is to go with Allen County Builders uh it is fits under our budget a total of $763,000 which does include a $25,000 contingency allowance within the bid Allen County Builders General Contractor uh will incorporate this project as you know they are also uh in charge of ceiling lighting piping replacement project uh and so it'll be weaved end to the overall project with expected completion of November of 25 I will tell you we did rece received two bids uh one was from Acorn sound technology um that particular group is not a certified contractor through the Indiana Department of Public Works uh they were contacted they are aware and they do agree and so their bid was uh not allowed so our uh recommendation from Mr thornsbury and our group is for Allen County Builders and I know you do have the bid tabs and uh we're looking forward please note that the current PA will remain on through the entire project until it is the other is up and running as soon as it is up and running then the other will be dismantled and then Chuck it's also important to to say that this goes far beyond just a PA system yeah super uh important uh one of the this particular PA system has an amazing opportunity for school safety and so as a part of this um and Mr Trout's leadership on this was uh was uh appreciated uh we have options for uh communication purposes uh lanyards in the future for our teachers uh that would have automatic communication out with Emergency Services as needed I know that many of you pay attention to school safety and what you're getting is not just a PA system it is a PA system capable of communication as needed during emergency procedures so this is a um not only is our PA struggle here in terms of just basic communication but this model will allow um as we've done everywhere to school safety to be a priority so I'm very excited uh for this installation for Huntington North I appreciate Terry Mike Sumpter uh Pat mcclaflin and Mr trout and uh as we were cooperatively working on this process so um the uh bid is under budget and we're excited uh for this recommendation for our kids all right thank you Mr bmbe would anyone like to make a motion regarding the recommended Award of a bid for the PA system motion to approve the bid from Allen County builders for the PA system at hunting to North High School thank you Mr mure is there a second any questions comments or discussion from the board all right hearing none we'll vote on the motion to approve all right motion passes 6 to Zer when I go to i1 the much anticipated volume 34 Board number one policy and administrative guideline updates um I have for the first reading tonight uh 15 updates uh for Schoolboard policies along with five administrative guidelines um I'm not seeking your approval this evening these are just updates that um Mrs Gray and I have been working on um this is the first of a series of ones coming your way over the next few meetings and so uh I just if you have any questions about any of this please do not hesitate to let me know as we continue to work through this but this will make us current in these um policies uh for the upcoming year so we will bring this back for a second reading and approval at the December 16th board meeting all right we'll now move to J1 items of discussion by board members Mr Roth I have a a couple that I'd just like to share out I want to do a special recognition to Gary mlen for 25 years of dedicated service to our elementary basketb program in officiating games with his team of officials so much appreciated I I believe um and Gary you can correct me if I'm wrong has never taken any compensation uh for officiating the games in our district um and what a servant Hood attitude and spirit that he has and I just want to recognize those efforts they are much appreciated he's done an awesome job and that's 25 years of dedicated service and so I wanted to recognize Gary for that also I want to do a special thanks to Matt meler Matt attended every Elementary Tournament game he was sitting there at the table collecting admissions of course he was there with his lovely wife um but I so appreciate that um servant Hood attitude uh Spirit uh he was there and just want to recognize that and let our public know that uh our board members are out there uh being servants as well and we TR truly appreciate that that effort that they put forth just want to recogniz thank you yeah uh two quick things I'd like to thank Pat mlin I know he's still here uh how many kids were at the Fall Formal 650 yeah 650 students were here uh Saturday night and uh a lot of hard work by uh staff um and students um you know student council uh put together a pretty nice event and it went off without a hitch from everything that I heard and then uh for those of you that followed along congrats to the Huntington North football team uh it was pretty fun to go to Lebanon and watch a really dramatic game uh win down there um and uh heast Noble didn't turn out how we hope but U it was a really awesome season a fine group of young men and uh coaches to support them so congrats on on that group and Mt I uh would add that we're hopeful that coach esbach and his captains might uh be here for the December 16th meeting to be recognized all right anything else all right I'll entertain a motion to adjourn so moved is there a second second all those in favor say I I opposed all right we are adjourned
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for our lovely senior community and that will be at the Lawrence Community Center thank you sorry they were not in order but it's quite all right uh Miss Norman do you have a report for the foundation please yes I do the thanks for giving reception recent ly for donors was a success we enjoyed great performances by our own Lawrence Township students uh please consider LT School foundation on giving Tuesday December 3rd the we have set a goal of raising $2500 on that day and a lot of companies match and then finally uh teachers the ne the next edex shopping day is Monday December 9th from 1: to 5:00 p.m.
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here on the second flooor and that's all I have okay that's all we have for our committee reports we will move on to our action items the first action item is the approval of the 1028 preliminary determination resolution Mr miles please at this time I ask the that the board approve the 1028 resolution as presented so moved second properly moved and second seconded is there any further discussion on the 10 28 all those in favor I I any opposed we will move forward to the approval of the early childhood education programming and fees M oh oh I'm sorry you're right curriculums I'm sorry Mr thank you madam president Dr Smith members of the board I recommend approval of the curricular advisory recommendations as presented so moved second properly moved and seconded any further conversation all those in oh yes please I do want to say how much it is appreciated I was at an event at Lauren Central the open house and I was talking to um members of the CTE program and they were extraordinarily excited about the new recommendations and so uh just want to give thanks to that committee for the hard work that they put into bringing us such fantastic recommendations and thank you so much for leading that Mr notor so all in favor I and any opposed I heard five eyes so I don't think so I guess we passed our curriculum uh we will now we will move on M cl to um the approval of the early childhood education programming and fees thank you president must Dr Smith members of the board tonight I ask for your approval for the presentation that was shared on the 11th so moved second properly moved and seconded any any other discussion all those in favor I I any opposed okay with the eyes have it we will now move on to the approval of the Craig Academy that is uh M Mr KCK and Dr Brown Madam president Dr Smith members of the board at the November 11th work session the team shared information concerning the proposed Craig Academy this included two recommendations one approval of the programmatic concepts for the building and two approval of a name change from lecc to Craig Academy recommend the board approve as submitted do have a motion to approve so move second second properly moved and seconded we have um some members of the public that would like to speak to this um so I would like to Now call Mr Eric Young forward please uh Mr Young we we we do know you but state your name and your address and we'll have three minutes for comment and then there we have about uh four people scheduled to speak so I would just ask that once a a point is made just in the interest of time to move forward okay thank you all right good evening um Eric Young 8354 teista Circle um I was glad to learn about the future of Craig at the last meeting I would like to bring up a few questions of or points for you to consider um first thank you for adding some estimates around the cost to tonight's presentation that's on the board docs this information is very much needed and I think allows you the board to make an informed decision and fulfill fill your promise of fiscal responsibility there was much discussion at the last meeting about current staff transferring to Craig prep I understand some staff may make this choice but I implore the board to ensure we are backfilling those positions thus the cost of the resulting new hire should still be included in the cost of Craig prep as you know we currently have many open teaching positions and teachers have been raising alarms about the current class sizes further signal a need for more teachers the presentation of Craig prep indicates that we need this Academy to compete with Charter and private schools can you please share with us the names of the charter and private schools that are currently offering this type of Academy and what has been their enrollment Trend can you please share the market research you've conducted that shows the strong desire for a school like Craig prep what will be the success criteria of Craig prep could you help me better understand the process of student selection for Craig prep I know you've said it will mirror the current school choice process but how does that work will there be considerations given to ensure there is diverse mix of students at Craig prep meaning all achievement levels genders racial groups and socioeconomic levels and if so how are those considerations incorporated as reported at the last meeting we lost 386 students to Charter and private schools how many of these students left for a school that offers what Craig prep will offer we also lost 80 students to HSC and 91 to Mount Vernon why did those students leave I know some students leave because of family move but I also know that we have quite a few families who choose to live within the LT District but send their students to a different school after having having attended an LT school we also have many teachers leing The District in recent months I have talked to many many teachers and families in our community and the repeating theme I've heard is that student behavior is a huge problem perhaps our number one problem I was told over and over again that students are not held accountable and do not have consequences this is not only a secondary school problem it's at all levels my request to the board tonight is to postpone your vote on this matter to allow time to make sure this is the absolute best use of this building and the best use of our money we need to have more focus on improving student Behavior perhaps an expanded quote unquote alternative school program that could help with student Behavior would be a good use I would also suggest if you have extra money that needs to be spent maybe we can look at a better funding for our schools so teachers and parents are not funding clinics Expo markers calculators and theik thank you for your comments Mr Young uh next I have we appreciate your comments um Miss Amanda [Music] Rose we'll wait till the till the dingy dingy start stuff yeah we'll set we'll wait till we set I was like I don't get five minutes seven you get more than zero we'll get this set for you it's fine can I go ahead and identify myself before absolutely all right um I'm Amanda Rose co-president of the Lawrence Education Association and also a resident of Lawrence Township I live at 852 East 56 Street [Music] Sheila would you like me to do an alarm on all right good evening Madam president Dr Smith and members MERS of the board typically when I address the board it is on behalf of the teacher members that I serve tonight however I'm speaking to you on the behalf of the students of Lawrence Township for the data shared at the work session on November 11th our district has over 16,000 students 85% or over 13,000 of whom are students of color and 45% or over 7,000 of whom are African-American it concerns me that we are committing to serving only 200 students initially and up to 400 at full enrollment at Craig Academy with a focus on African-American culture that is only 6% of our African-American students and 3% of our students of color when fully enrolled how is this Equitable to the many students of color in our district in addition with the set enrollment limits this proposal is perpetuating the class- siiz inequity we are already experiencing across the district and that this board has committed to exploring through a distri district committee since 2018 our schools have seen a tremendous growth in multilanguage Learners and while I can anticipate the response to that being the increase of our immersion programs I would counter with how does this help the ever growing number of Haitian students who do not speak Spanish but Haitian Creole or French our Spanish speaking students too are not always benefiting from the emerging program when they are working primarily in their home language of Spanish without enough English instruction or English supports we have so many students in our district that would benefit from an environment focused on the African diaspora an environment of small smaller class sizes and environment filled with the Cadence contribution and pride of the African-American culture so why wouldn't this be a focus in all of our schools finally I am concerned that this proposal was begun in 2018 but in the last two years as Leo Lea co-president there have been no additional committee meetings involving Lea members even though the November 11th board presentation stated that the committee was reconvened in 2023 once again teachers are expressing frustration that they are not only not being heard but are not even welcome at the table for these reasons I urge you at a minimum postpone this vote on Craig Academy until a more fully inclusive and realized plan can be put into place thank [Music] you thank you so much Miss Rose um next up we have Miss K [Music] oie good evening Madame President Dr Smith members of the board I'm Carrie Obie vice president and member organizer of the Lawrence Education Association I'm going to skip I have to ask why it is necessary to vote on the programmatic elements of Craig Prep Academy tonight there are many questions from teachers and community members that have never been answered by District administration across the many times these proposals have been brought forth as an organizer for a teachers union my role is to bring teachers together around an issue when I saw this was on the agenda for a vote i s out a call for input through an anonymous survey to our members like the push back we experienced during contract negotiations our methods and motives were called into question it's disheartening to see that the concern of teachers are often overlooked or dismissed by administrators we know schools met resistance from their principles for asking questions about the proposal and the distribution of the survey this contributes to a strain relationship between the two groups ultimately hindering our ability to provide the best possible education for our students we believe that open communication and collaboration between Administration and teachers are essential for creating positive and productive learning environments a Hallmark of a healthy Community is how we handle conflict and have courageous conversations I urge the board the cabinet and each of our administrators to pause and listen our teachers are ready to stand up and fight for all of our schools we want your support in our work moving forward for the 76% of respondents who question this proposal I'm calling for a postponement of this vote and a more robust and detailed plan can be delivered thank you thank you Miss Obie uh Mr Eric Marty please good evening uh I am Eric Marty uh co-president of laa addresses 3101 winther Bing uh I am speaking tonight on the topic of the proposed Craig prep academy uh I firmly believe that it is imperative that we provide an inclusive and culturally responsive um curriculum for all students in our district in survey in surveying our membership of over 300 teachers a frequent question asked was why we would want to limit this opportunity to only 100 students at each of two grade levels eventually expanding to four grade levels when we have thousands who could benefit from this proposed curriculum and similar possibilities our bilingual students um students of other uh nationalities and ethnicities our lgbtq students just to name a few other subgroups equally deserve to learn from a curriculum that celebrates their identity and allows them to explore the roots of their resp respective cultures this is especially important as some of our national and state leaders in the political Arena have ostracized and targeted some of those very same communities and students incorporating such curriculum into all our schools and providing our staff with the appropriate support and training would truly set our district apart even further as a district of destination within This concerns have also been raised by our members in regards to the admission process um outside of implementing an application and Lottery process not much has been shared about how the district plans to fairly choose which students will have access to this opportunity I think offering more specifics on this process would help address some concerns and create more buyin amongst teachers who can then promote the academy through their own personal networks thank you thank you so much Mr Marty we appreciate all of you who have taken the time to come here and speak to us with us tonight um board um Miss Norman do you have questions you you sure sure uh yes yes comment some questions so first of all I don't want to reiterate what comments were made however I do um think that there are some ongoing concerns that I personally have um as a member of the board um I think first and foremost um we've heard tonight about the cost of or the debt that we have um in the district and we know that running another building our new administration building with custodial cost overhead deferred or maintenance over the years plus the maintenance of this building we've not seen a rundown of what that cost would be over the years which is concerning we've seen costs such as potential staff um but we also haven't seen the cost of time over time what that would look like in addition when this was first proposed it was in 2018 since the last board meeting as Miss must shared we have had an election an election where we know um that there are going to be potential impacts to members of our community Lawrence Township currently has 25% of our staff who or I'm sorry of our students who are identified as English Learners we do not know how many of those students may choose to stay in Indiana due to unfortunately the election and the results of that election at a recent meeting that I attended from Exodus and Catholic Charities the annual Refugee um collaboration it was shared by Cole Varga the executive director of Exodus that we have over 10,000 Haitian members of our community that are on temporary protective status it is the hope of Donald Trump to remove to protective temporary protective status for Haitian immigrants to this country if that happens it will have a massive impact not just on Lawrence Township but also to other districts throughout Marian County we are relying on an increase in enrollment to do the work that we are asking the community to support yet we are not guaranteed that the enrollment will continue to increase I am very very very concerned as not just somebody who sits on this board but also as an education an educator in a neighboring District about the impact that this will have I've also seen how places like Logansport that have a very large immigrant population that uh we've had the attorney general that is asking for records for undocumented students it is a scary time and one in which I am very concerned about taking on more debt in a district where we already are over almost a half a billion dollars in debt I also am concerned that there is not a full fleshed out plan for the I 3 we will be passing policy about why or what we have to do um for the retention of students who do not pass I 3 unfortunately that is going to hit home very hard here in Lawrence and throughout Central Indiana and the state as a whole we have not identified what the funding sources are to ensure that we are continuing to educate those students who will be retained that is not maybe they will be retained but right now sv1 states that they will be retained and we do not know the financial implications that this has for one year two years three years four years five you get my drift in addition the number of students cons served is of concern um I also agree that the curriculum should be offered across the district I'm also concerned that we don't know that we have Partners it was shared that there are potential partners for the adult education but yet we don't have a fully um there's not a contract in place we don't know if Excel or crystal house doors or another partner is willing to partner with us and finally I believe it is important to listen to our community this is the first time I've sat on this board where I've seen a number of people that have spoken on behalf of something inviting us to postpone a decision and I would respectfully request that we listen to members of our community on this and postpone this decision thank you Miss St M Norman yes um thank you for that I think we just need some time for the seeking to understand peace I'm overall very supportive of this I um I did have a question of the the union I know that they had said they already conducted a survey of about 300 teachers is that correct is that only of teachers union members or is that of other teachers around the district because I know we have over 60% teachers who are not in the union so I want I didn't know if they were also included in that discussion or if it violates anything I'll speak to that as the Lawrence Education Association we represent all teachers whether they are members or not we speak for our people that respond to our surveys whether they are members or not we speak for teachers yeah and I appreciate that I just didn't know if the survey was actually sent to non-union members as well I just wanted that clarification because we are here we want to seek to understand the entire community and as mentioned students are part of our community um have we sought more input on what the students and even those of us as parents were seeking as well so um th those are the only comments that I had the other questions I had have already been asked so thank you done I'm sorry I did that last night Miss Norman I share your similar concerns I think um I think the educational components of this program as was stated before would be incredibly valuable for our community as a whole um limitating to 400 students has me a bit concerned I also am concerned that the uh task force was convened in 2018 and that was a lifetime ago it was a pandemic ago it was a school district that's changed significantly uh and as a member of this board I do feel that while I appreciate having some addition um figures added to the proposal um it was done in a PowerPoint and not necessarily as a as a business proposal and I have concerns um to the piece that Miss dun spoke about um the increasing costs that we as a district are bearing as we know um from the last board meeting we have gone into deficit spending to pay down our health insurance for our teachers um and that is of significant concern um my first and uh my first Duty as a board member is to ensure that we use our taxpayer dollars wisely I'm very supportive of having uh you know curriculum that helps support the majority of our community and I think it's critically important that we do so but I feel there needs to be more time and more vetting done with our community members and with other partners to ensure that we uh are actually carrying out the will of our community thank you very much Miss Pucket I have a question I was reading through our notes from last meeting um Dr Smith can you elaborate on um the portion where it says uh that utilizing this building as a school would be protecting our building as assets for our district just wanted to can you elaborate on that well I think uh I have something else after that certainly if we don't utilize the building which we already this point of clarification we currently have students that are in this building we have Lawrence Advance Academy which is our high school Alternative Program public and we also have Miss NE Meer several special needs students that are receiving services in the building so we want to make that point of clarification but if the building is not utilized it could become open to Charter Schools if they so choose to take it so it is important for us to utilize Craig as a school building and I'm going to continue to recommend that to the Board of Education that we do Place students in this building so that's part of the proposal and that's all I have but they answer your question ma'am oh yes is there a time limit or a time frame on on that like if it's is there a term to that that is there a deadline for that in order to or I'm hoping that I'm phrasing that correctly I I think there is a deadline uh I would have to get more specifics with that if we were not utilizing the building for something that yes a school could come in and asked to take part of the building or take the building and I do appreciate every everything that was shared today it is something to think about um but it's it's a continuance of a continued concern of mine of us having these concerns before we get to they asked um I received your questions on Friday we have to continue to have these question or have this dialogue amongst each other also because now this this needs to be processed this needs to be taken in I would love to it is not the what it's the how that I will continue to like to have a part of what you're thinking and these ideas so I could have input and so that I can also have an ability to conversate with that and I that's not a jab I sincerely mean that well and I I I respect that I think a lot has happened in the last two weeks especially since the election as I alluded to in the comments that made this happen and especially comments that I've received from the public in the last just over the last 48 hours so this has really been one of those things that has I think a lot of members of the public were um not aware that there would be a vote on this this evening and so I think that that's where I respectfully ask not to vote Yes or no but just like you there's been a lot that we've had to process with the election and other things and how that may impact the District of is there a world where we can just postpone and get more information from the community okay and then the postponement what would that affect how would that Dr Smith what would be the if there was a post I work for you guys you guys tell me what's going on right there a lot of things that have been said that I didn't hear tonight for tonight and so I respected the board people have to understand I work for the board and so you tell me what it is this is always important is there a percentage that the school has to be utilized and uh and we don't plan on having students in this proposed program until 2027 so it seems to me as though there is a bit of time we're currently utilizing the building which seems in adherence to State statue in order to protect june5 but it was my understanding that it was about students using the building building is being used as Administration that will change in June 2025 because we will take POS understood but I heard you say and correct me if I'm wrong that it needs to be used used for students we have students in the building that's that's right we do have students and and so that's not from my understanding of The Proposal that's not changing in any way so we would still be inherence with still have students in the building but we will be working to we renovate the building to have new school in the building so no one would be able to take the building we're moving in that direction and more than 50% of will be used at that time when we get to know for the go filling so we are protecting our asset okay so a few questions is it the 50% is that the mark that you're saying yes it's 60 I don't have laws on yeah 60% um and and would it be reasonable to assume that if we don't have students in but the building is under renovation for classrooms for the children that that would be protected okay don't okay right okay so I had you have a couple questions um regarding custodial and maintenance um Mr Smith we are already paying for custodial and maintenance in this building correct correct they're still under our districtwide maintenance program so that side of it would not change that would not change U but if we put more students in here we may have to add one more person uh to cover the space that it's utilized and that would be through a growth as the plan suggests right now we're we're doing all of Upstairs Downstairs in the lower level currently so we're taking care of the building already so that wouldn't be an issue um I would like to say from an historical point of view um that in 2018 we were having this conversation and um like many of the people many of our public who's spoken tonight and the board um we were concerned that um we needed to have a universal program in our school that protected our children um protected them um and so we started our Equity policy and that was not a shortterm um um Endeavor we worked on that for two years uh we had a survey of over 2,000 um respondents and um we have worked very hard with our public to create Equity standards to remove barriers for all children because we too felt at the time and still that all of our children need to have barriers removed having said that um I would like um a couple of things questions we began an immersion program in and it started small and because the program was so popular um Mr notor could you kind of give us a background on how that program has grown and built over time because there was such a need for it briefly sure if you can so originally uh began with Force Glenn students from Force Glenn matriculated to Craig Middle School to Lawrence North and I believe there were two classrooms of 25 each so there were 50 children in each classroom yes originally and then um several years later it was decided that Forin would become completely dual language so completely Spanish Immersion um by that time Craig had closed and so feeds into F Creek Valley and then Lawrence north um with the um large influx of Spanish speakers as well as the uh Community demand of English speakers to become bilingual um dual language was expanded to Skyles test Elementary to uh Sunnyside Elementary as full dual language two-way schools um one-way dual language was put in place at Harrison Hill Elementary Indian Creek Elementary uh Mary Castle Elementary um with the plan that Skyles test as well as some of the oneway programs would matriculate to Belzer those students are now eighth graders at Belzer and then on to Lawrence Central for next year so that that program has grown exponentially thank you very much um I I'll I'll I'll give you the floor in a moment um so um could you also give us a little bit of a background on when you were principal at Belzer and your HonorBound and how we marketed that to our families and what the response was and how what that program is today and what were the results what were the outcomes sure so the the need really um at that time when I was principal was around meeting the needs of a potentially High achieving African-American young men and recognizing that we as a school were greatly underserving that population and so began a program called HonorBound um where students were invited to participate um who really had the potential to excel academically if they were in the right environment where it was cool to be smart where it was school to to get good grades and um the students have excelled have excelled uh not only at the middle school but in AP courses at the high school um several have have graduated and and most have gone on to college but that program really and it it's still in existent today so this what we're talking about the evened in terms of Craig prep is not taking the place of any of the programming that we currently have going in in the district but it's about another way to meet students needs in a smaller environment so the the parent input um at that for that program um was really the sentiment that it was long overdue and now we're going on that was almost 15 years ago um that that was was long overdue and so really very well received by the community very much appreciated by the community um and again has shown success for for those students and then can you tell me what what you would foresee if the demand for this program exceeds the space we have available here as a district we have always been committed to meeting the needs of our community and as those needs are expressed either through um where students choose to go to school or students on a weight list um that's really how the the um Spanish imersion program expanded was because the weight list had had gotten to be significant we work to provide programming to meet the needs of our families so that there's not weight list that families get what they want and that were able to meet their needs so if demand exceeds the space in this building you could foresee um Dr Smith the possibility of expanding this program into more schools okay and I and I um I would like to thank everyone involved in Lawrence Township um particularly Dr Smith when you came to this District um it was a new phase of drilling down to the needs of every individual's child and um that has made all the difference and I think that's why you see and I sound like a broken record but you see this graduation rate of 95% with 1% waivers because we drill down to the needs of every single child um Lawrence Academy Advance Academy was a new program that we um instituted in this building and it has proven to give our high schoolers um an a wonderful chance to for credit recovery and um to make that graduation happen for them um I think that's those are my questions those are my comments Miss D do you have thank you so I do have a question U Mr notor um Forest Glenn started in the district as um my understanding a gentrification of dual language of trying to keep primarily white families in the district because they were leaving to go to um the international school is that correct well that was back in 1994 started speak that which I think that that's historically is something that um is very well known um across Central Indiana I also know that the expansion of the programming is a result of the 25% of English Learners that we have who are primarily Spanish speaking and the fact that that uh the Dual language is in fact based on Research one of the Premier top tier ways to ensure that students are acquiring English correct as well as becoming bilingual and biliterate tremendous programs for sure I do wonder what research we have on the curriculum that we are wanting to employ does it have the same type of research where have we gotten that research because I think what Miss must is bringing up is a very valid point that there are some programs that we have expanded that research has shown are the right things to do and I guess I'm just curious in in terms of a program that is just in one school that's apocentric what is the research on that is opposed to ensuring that all students across all schools are getting access to that yeah and and the research for Afrocentric education is not quite as strong as the Dual language research that you're you're alluding to but really this proposal is about a small school environment with an Afrocentric Focus so it's not about it being Afrocentric it's about it being small um that families have the opportunity to make that choice of I want my students to be part of a class of 100 as a seventh grader or an eighth grader as opposed to a class of 600 or 500 at our larger middle schools so the the small school really is the focus which is great for those students right the small school but it's for those 200 or 300 or 400 students that have access uh small class sizes though we know that research shows that smaller class size show improve academic outcomes across the board correct um I'm not familiar with that particular particular research I'm familiar with research that indicates that a range of class size is Optimum for academic needs the class sizes of 33 34 that in some of our class in some of our schools are not conducive necessarily to the best learning environment and I think that that's where my focus is on student outcomes for the whole District um and what those student outcomes are going to look like for all of those students the students who are not part of the small school I also am curious as to how this is a line to the equity work because I did not see this as any of the goals or um any of our metrics of having a school like this with the equity audit so I may have missed something in that but I I don't believe that that was part of the equity audit so I just want to make sure this school was not part of theity audit right but it was when we first discussed this school we decided to make our Equity work District what okay does that right but it wasn't necessarily a recommendation nor is it aligned any of our goals our board goals as it pertains to student outcomes just want to make sure I'm not okay thank you board do we have any more questions I'll just have a quick comment um again just from lived experience as having um a young black male within our Township and I have the experience of having a high ability student who's needs were not met in education and the byproduct of that is a a smart child who's bored that's in my experience where some in my experience where some of the behavioral concerns came from and became a focus on behavior and not so much on the intellect of my child and so just as a mother who has experienced um and I am grateful and that's and that's one of the reasons why I chose to serve is because I do have some experiences within our Township like I said I am Lawrence for me is like a marriage it's not the things that are great that keep you there it's those things that you e and flow and you choose to grow with and so I'm grateful for the high ability review that makes it to where children um like my son um were able to be I identified and and be able to have their needs met I say that to say he was in the third grade when this cycle started his first teacher of color was when he was in the sixth grade and it was his best year representation matters I hear all of the concerns that we are we are expressing there's things that I wish I could say and I can't say at at this day as right now but what I do know is I have a child who's now majoring in engineering as a mother I always saw it there I just needed those I needed the support to push my son and Dr harsh barer you already know you kept me in this District you remember them conversations I had with you so I say that to say just from lived experience I know I was a mother that looked at other um other schools for my child CU I wanted my son to have a smaller environment I wanted him to have an environment where he had a cultural awareness um and I saw for for myself and I'm a and I am we are a family that focuses on heart health not on color not on anything else are the heart health of our family are you a decent human being that treats people right but my son noticed and I saw as a parent that my son had a tremendous change in the sixth grade and the only thing that really changed was that he had a teacher of color that recognized and could identify and so and there were cultural nuances there were things that made him enjoy learning again so I say that to say that is part my lived experience is part of my why for the Craig Academy yes I do have I have a lot of questions I have a whole onslaught of questions um again I appreciate the dialogue here um but again that's just my experience as a parent and why I do support yes I do continue to want to look forward to be answering these questions and um leaning in to these things but as a parent and as also neighbors friends who have thought about leaving um because this is needed and I'll digress there my comment thank you very much Bo if there are no further comments um the proposal to approve the Craig Academy has been moved been seconded um we'll be ready for a vote all those in favor I I I opposed nay I'll be abstaining I don't have the information good accurate this evening all right we have approved the Craig academy uh we will move on to the approval of Neola policies Mr harbart Dr barer I will get it right before my last meeting I'll answer to pretty much anything um Madame President Dr Smith members of the board earlier I brought to you for second reading volume 36 number two Neo revisions I now recommend the board approve those as submitted so moved second properly moved and seconded is there any discussion on this Neola policies all in favor of those approvals I I any opposed we have approved the Neola policies Adam president I move we treat action items 5.06 through 5.12 as consent agenda you have a second second um properly moved and seconded is there any discussion all in favor of the consent agenda I I opposed um and just for our public again we we've said this before but um our um consent agenda um are are not what You' call Big Ticket items our consent agenda uh our minutes from the last meeting approval of personnel reports the approval of claims the approval of service agreements the approval of pay apps and building project payments um the approval of fundraisers and field trips and so are um are the types of of business um approvals we have to we have to take care of once mon um so um I move approval of the consent agenda you have a second second properly moved and seconded all those in favor of approving the consent agenda hi hi hi we have approved our consent agenda which brings us to our board comments um we had a lot of comments this evening already but do we have any um concerns or celebrations we haven't discussed congratulations to all the the students we celebrated today I mean that's why we're truly here and to all the staff and parents who drive them to practice and do all the things so that was a a wonderful night um I also want to congratulate everyone at the state and local level on the recent elections uh one of the unique uh I guess tight RPP walks we serve as board members as being nonpartisan and during this election cycle I got to uh interact with both sides of the aisle and it was encouraging that there are some people who understand our role um and other people who want us to be very one-sided but I just want to thank the public for um just coming out and sharing their heart too we got to interact with a lot of people in Lawrence who we normally wouldn't get to to meet and just so many wonderful things some feedback we'll have to talk about but um yeah so budget's coming up thank you thank you bucket I share the same sentiment um the caign thank you I thank you to the public for the vote to retain my seat and the con I literally had thousands of conversations and so um some were some sandpaper conversations they rough you up to smooth you out people are very passionate and I can honestly say that um it is a it was a blessing to hear everything that I heard 11 meet and greets speaking at churches I had never went that hard and I tell you that it was an absolute blessing to which I'm already out just from the other work that I do but the conversations and the love for our community I saw the secretary from Harrison Hill when I went to Harrison Hill she knew my name and I don't know if that's good or bad but she knew my name I saw Mr major an educator of mine who saw the gold in me as a child and pulled that and actually he literally because I always I mean I often say that um our our leaders who show their leadership skills a little differently that we may call them difficult they just need to have those skills cultivated and it was um Mr Majors that saw that Skilling me as a child so I say that to say it was so many conversations that were had that continued to root me in why I'm in Lawrence just born bred and love it here and so I'm grateful and I am I am honored to continue to serve and continue to hear from every point of view that is one thing I am passionate unfortunately I'm not emotional and it's been a blessing to share that passion and hear the passion of others and see how I can continue to serve in this capacity so that's my comment so thank you thank you all um I would like to um congratulate um Mr Ron Davy and Miss Tracy means for all the work you've done over the years our Lawrence Advance Academy I see that's a that's a 10year trajectory now we celebrated that a few weeks ago and if you look at our graduation rate from 10 years ago it goes like this thank you thank you thank you for all your hard work we appreciate you very much there are so many celebrations in our district um I'm leaving too many out um we the district got a wonderful award from U the national um n [Music] National Lang English English English language Learners uh the national organizational yes and um Dr Smith was recognized on behalf of the district for the for the incredible work we have done which is huge for in our English language learning and our dual language which is an incredible honor and a national recognition um our next meeting will be um December 16th on Monday and we will begin at 5:30 Dr Smith do you have comments for us this evening oh did I I thought they said they had none yeah Happy Thanksgiving everybody has a great break yeah I also no that's okay but I also want to take a moment and congratulate um vice president Norman as well as secretary Pucket um and I'm very excited to work um with Miss mahand so excited for the new year and we've only got one more board meeting so yeah and thank you for your service we'll certainly be celebrating you at the next board meeting president must thank you so much I have no com comments board look at their eyes thank you all for good night everyone meeting yeah thank you we are adjourned oh we we need to moved to be adjourned so moved and now we're Jour thanks for um thank you all for really good really good
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[Music] hello and welcome to this very special Around the Clock I'm your host galanda Greaves I'm sure many of you have already heard that Steve Ulus a wonderful resident past resident here of Ashland has recently passed away our hearts are with his family his wife Amy and his daughters Carly and Rachel we wanted to do our part to share a little bit of what we knew about Steve with our community if you knew Steve Ulus at all you knew that he had a big heart and he made anyone feel special whether you were with standing with him or chatting with him for a few minutes or for many hours or had the opportunity to see him do what he loves to do which is Cook Steve was a big supporter here of the waa TV station he spent time on our board from 2002 to 20 20 22 he also was instrumental in helping us get this lovely Studio at Butterfield Drive in the 2012 to 2013 time period the other thing that Steve did was he supported so many Charities and so many different things here in Ashland one of the first times I met Steve and got to know him was when he brought one of his first trucks for barbecue up to the now Middle School it was then the high school as we were trying to pass the the vote for the new high school and he supplied chicken and the fixen and it was a fundraiser and it was just so much fun another time we had to we got to see Steve was he had his own show here on waca called All Fired Up and he filmed that from 1999 till about 2014 and again it was one of those things he cooked in different places he took you all different places to see food to try food to cook food just showed put off his personality uh also in 2001 he started fireflies up in marbor and if you've never had fireflies barbecue it's time to go check it out so Steve also did a show called The Iron Chef it was held uh at the Ashlin High School the current H Ashlin high school and it was between two administrators at the time and he had this huge group of celebrity judges including our current Senate president Karen spilka she was just a senator at that point our State Rep Tom Sandro and a number of other people and he was just so excited to bring that to our community uh the other thing was he would bring turkeys to the mes when they were doing their Thanksgiving event uh and I was chatting with my daughter and she said I I think he brought barbecue up to the high school for a few years when I was a senior and during Senior week so he really cared and gave back to our community one of the other big things that he did was he supported a lot of Charities and there was a charity that he that was very close to him and close to us here at waca and that was when he supported Jake silver Jake silver did different shows with us here uh and fireflies and Steve Ulus supported Jake and his family uh during his time battling with cancer uh the other thing for me was again I got to know through all these things but one of the best opportunities when it was when I was invited to do a special with Steve cooking a Thanksgiving dinner we cooked turkey and the all the sides and I learned how to chop professionally and we cooked here in the kitchen at waca TV and we just had so much fun so we're going to share with you the episode that he and I filmed back in 2016 I think it might have been called turkey time or Thanksgiving time uh very appropriate for this time of year so enjoy this reowing of this wonderful cooking opportunity that I had with Steve Ulus and our hearts go out to the Ulus family as well as the fireflies community and anyone who ever knew or was touched by Steve Ulus [Music] hey I'm Steve UL we all fired up and I am with an incredible friend a special guest Yanda Greaves the one and only thanks for having me Steve I'm I'm so excited that we've that we are doing this I've been wanting to cook with you for a long time and we haven't done a show in a long time so you okay well perfect reason to do it exactly I needed someone special to do with and that's why we're here all right let's talk about what we're going to do so it's the holiday season right so I figured what more Americana right than doing something for the holiday so we're going to do an amazing apple cider brryan turkey O stuffed with a cornbread and sausage stuffing that sounds good we're going to make a homemade cranberry sauce yum we're going to make brussels sprouts roasted with pan CH we're then going to make a homemade gravy which you made sauce homemade stock and then we're going to finish it all off with a brownie pie oh brownie pie I think that's going to be pretty good I think so too it's making me hungry can't wait so let's get started we got a lot of stuff to do on a show window of time so the first thing we're going to do is this Brine and everyone asked me this question you asked me earlier yeah does it make a difference right it does it makes a huge difference when you can Infuse that that kind of flavor into the turkey or any type of meat that you brine it adds moisture it adds flavor and it is to die for so that's what we're going to do and this one we do all the time at fireflies all right so first of all you're going to pass me that apple cider so for about a 12 to 18 lb turkey you're going to need to make a couple gallons of brine so we're going to use some apple cider this time of year the best apple cider and then I'm going to have you fill this up with some cold water and this frine doesn't have to be cooked this is just it's going to be made cold and then you can take this and put the turkey right into it so we've got we've got the cider yep you're going to fill that up with cold water I'm then going to take brown sugar some white brown sugar I'm going to take some kosher salt I'm going to take some cracked black pepper Yolanda this is just pepper that has been cracked I'm going to take some cinon some Sage some thyme am I filling this all the way Steve all the way to the top that'll be great taking a little longer over there and then what we're going to do is we going to whisk that together once you come over with the water y we'll be good to go on that that's good enough yoland that's perfect yep we going to take that water we're going to add that in and that's pretty much it that's a simple brine you're going to take the turkey you're going to submerge it completely and the best thing to do on that is to take this and what I use is I take a a cooler an actual cooler and I'll take some ice cubes and I'll actually put the turkey inside that cooler and keep it overnight and for 24 hours it's beautiful or you can take it right inside um into a large vessel throw it right into the refrigerator you have like a big Lobster Pot big Lobster Pot works great it's a perfect idea so that's it on the brine you just dissolve it throw the turkey in 24 hours SS good let's get rolling on the stuffing cuz this is going to take one while stuffing is my favorite part okay well this is a beautiful stuffing so we've got some melted butter yep and have you take those onions and celery and you're going to pour that right into that pot we're going to cook this for about 10 to 12 minutes I'm going to let those get all nice and caramelized release all of the flavors those aromatics it's going to be fantastic so about how much onion and how much celery so that's about a half a pound about about a half a cup of butter and it's one onion and about four stocks of celery okay all right so we going to let that cook we're going to turn that up on high heat and we're going to let that simmer so question I mean I enjoy cooking I don't cook very often or very much as we're letting it simmer best to let it sit or best to stir it around we're going to want to stir it but what we want to do is we want to seal those you can hear that that Sizzle so it's a high heat with the butter we got it nice and hot we throw it in that pan and that's going to caramelize and start that but you going to let it sit wait a couple minutes then stir it and then as you're going to see as the sugars released from those vegetables you're going to start to carel more and C a little bit quicker so that takes a little bit of time so while that's cooking M we got to make this amazing gravy to go along with this right so we need something special all right so what we've done is we've taken the neck and the gizard out of the turkey right best part for gra best part right and what we did is we took another half pound of butter okay and we took the turkey neck and the gizzard and we Brown those up with about a cup of diced shallots now is that that's raw so you haven't cooked the the giz was right in there we're cooking the gizard and the and the neck with that clarified butter and with the shallots and that cooked for uh about 15 minutes so we got nice and Cal you can stir those Up Stir those up and then what we did all we did is we added some homemade chicken stock and if you don't have homemade chicken stock you need about two quarts you can buy the low sodium chicken stock in the superar market and throw it in there and to give it that homemade taste okay we added a sprag of Rosemary two sprigs of thyme two sprigs of parsley and a sprig of sage that's it nice and a bay leaf and a bay leaf and we we let it simmer for two hours so while that turkey is cooking away we're going to make that stop and that's going to be used in our pan gravy for that turkey okay pretty good yeah sounds good so far I like butter holiday cooking cannot be done without real butter you got to use real butter and I always use unsalted butter I think that's very important so everyone should understand what's the difference why would why unsalted versus because you can always adjust the salt you can't take it out so some Butters have a little bit higher salt content than others so you always start with unsalted butter cuz you can add as much salt as you'd like you know and we know how people have you know my wife is like boom too much salt so you know it's like like thanks a lot honey all right so we've got our stock simmering away we've got the Brian already made it I'm going to pass that over to my right hand Felipe he going to get that out of the way and then he's going to pass me over the ingredients um for the uh um he's going to take those for me and then we're going to work on the brownie pie because that's going to take an hour to bake right okay okay so we're going to keep cooking those those are on high and all I've done for the brownie pie if everyone can see over here yolander is I've taken a half a cup again the half a cup of unsalted butter is a a popular item with these recipes and then I've taken 4 ounces of unsweetened chocolate okay any particular brand that you like I I like I like y Deli you know one of my favores I think they do a really good job so we took some deli chocolate and we took some um unsalted butter and we melted it and then what you've got to do is you've got to let that sit for 20 minutes to cool down because we're going to temper it in to some eggs and some flour and we don't want a turtle or cook the eggs right right right right so that's cooking away like I said that's going to need a little bit more time this is simmering away this is ready to go why don't we take a quick break and we'll come on back and we'll get some more ingredients on the set and we'll put these three things together sounds good I'm Steve all fired up we'll be right back hey so we're back and we can see the caramelization of those uh celery and onions so if you could take that sausage pour that right into that pan that would be fantastic so all we did yoland is we took some spicy I like spicy as you know yes some spicy it sausage placed it on a sheet pan in the oven we fully cooked it Y and we took it um out of the oven and we put it into a quut and we Pate it so that's how it gets that crumbled look right so now what we're going to do is we're going to let those cook for about 3 to four or five minutes somewhere in there just get them nice and caramell and while you're doing that I'm going to take some of Firefly's famous cornbread I know you've had that oh yeah just a few times that's it so this is like you know you want it a day old you know so we've taken uh it's the equivalent to about 10 cupcakes or you know pieces of cornbread um and all we're going to do is we're just going to kind of crumble that up with our hands okay all right and we're just going to let that cornbread just like that pretty simple right um while that's continuing to cook I figured we would move on to finishing that brownie pie how does that sound that sounds good cuz everyone loves a good dessert you got to have a good dessert you got to have a good ending so tell me about like your Thanksgiving is like rich like cooking are you cooking what's going on so we sort of have a mixed plan he does the turkey and the gravy and that's his thing and myself and our two daughters Cristiana and Adriana help out by cutting up the vegetables setting the table uh and then we usually do Thanksgiving with Rich's family because my family is not close so there's about 12 of us and we have the turkey and the gravy and we set the dining room table and we just have a really nice relaxed eat and spend time with the family that's that is the best thing about that's what Thanksgiving is all about you know like you said it earlier there's no presents there's no pressure it's like you're with the family they're home from school it's all about the food that's what it's all about right so you know so this is again a great Thanksgiving meal a great Christmas meal right Hanukkah meal if you want right so let's move on to the brownie pie real quick so this is a very simple easy recipe so again we took the butter and we took the semi um unsweetened chocolate and we melted that down and that's now tempered nice cool 20 minutes now what we're going to do is we're going to take three egg yolks okay and we're going to take a cup and a half of sugar but we're going to beat the egg yolks a little bit first right in this little bowl mhm slightly beat those up we're then going to add the sugar we're going to add the vanilla about a tablespoon of vanilla sorry a teaspoon of vanilla and we're going to add about a/4 of a cup of flour and we're going to mix that all it's going to help bind this whole thing together right so we're just going to mix that up that's looking just like that looks pretty yummy right we're going to get that together make sure there's no lumps we don't want a lumpy brownie pie lump brownie pie is not good and then if you could just take that chocolate and scrape that right into there for me oh man you are a very good assistant not only a great politician a great assistant in the kit now now Steve I'm not a politician all right well a public servant serve our public in our town that is true and I I will tell you Yolanda you do an amazing job not only are you an incredible selectman and have helped this town Bensley but the bottom line is is that you have a show here on Ashton cable I do right around the clock and it's one like four national awards yeah so we have won the um Hometown awards for B new show two two years in a row and for the regional media we've also won two different Awards the last one was for our 2015 Marathon show we we do a whole show every year just on the Boston Marathon so yeah it's fun I Around the Clock I feel is a way to get information out to people and it's a way for me to be creative I come from a dance and and arts background I get to be creative as well as get information out to people in Ashland and it's great I mean I watch the show I think you do an amazing job I learned things every day about things that I did not even going on tell me about this new um popup thing that's happening Inter National I was intrigued by that so this is a great idea Beth Reynolds our economic development director as well as a number of other women they have formed this committee and it's called The Corner Spot and it's going to be taking place where six Cherry Street is so the old building the property is owned by the affordable housing trust but they don't have a a specific plan yet for what they're going to do so we're going to take down six Cherry Street it was shown that even though it's historic it's just not there's no way to rehab it and do something with the building so The Corner Spot is going to be a place it's going to be a temporary popup so they're going to do some Landscaping there's going to be um swings there's going to be places for people to sit but the best part is that there's going to be a place for businesses to come and try out being in Ashland so they're going to experiment be a temporary business maybe it's a coffee shop maybe it's a book shop maybe it's a food truck that wants to see how they could do an Ashland they maybe maybe we'll throw a firefly food truck over there that' be great CU I know people love fireflies and sometimes going to marbor might be a little bit far for people it is it is I can understand that so what's happening is they're doing a fundraiser uh and it's all donations so there's no Town tax dollars going into this program it's a huge thing and you know that there's a lot of popup restaurants that happen to do kind of the same thing you know I've had friends that you know have this idea this vision of wanting to a restaurant they can't afford to fun it they don't know how it's going to go so they'll actually use another person's kitchen and they'll actually try that hey give those a little stir I I was hearing them yeah so those are oh perfect so that's amazing so when is this fundraiser and you know how soon is this a reality or it's an ongoing online fundraiser and they can go to ashin mass.com to get to it and find The Corner Spot and you can donate to the to the fund and and if we meet if we make and raise $225,000 Mass development is going to match that $25,000 so our state tax dollars will be coming back to Ashland that's huge which is always a big thing we all know in Ashland there's nothing more than we need in this town as great as it is we need more business we need to drive that business tax revenue right I agree so if you could add that chicken stock we have a little bit of chicken stock that's going to go into here um and we're going to let that smell really good oh my gosh and if you can take right over there you can see that you have some sage and some parsley yep right there this is the sage we're going to throw there some sage in there we're going to throw that all in there and then we've got a little bit of that fresh parsley throw that whole parsley Cho parsley in there and then we're going to take a couple pinches of that salt yep you're going to pinch away some kosher salt beautiful and we're going to let that simmer so that that's really exciting Eland I'm excited and are real really excited about it so the goal is the fundraising goes until I believe the middle of November and then they have to have met the 25,000 and we're pretty close I was at a meeting last night and they were talking that we were already at $21,000 raised we had some really $4,000 left to go yeah that's great and then they're hoping for it to be up and running in June so as the farmers market comes back people can check that out as well that's phenomenal so let me just we're going to put the pie in the oven so this is a 9 in deep pie shell bought it right at the supermarket Good Old Market Basket right down the street and all we're going to do is we're going to add this right in here this is going to take at 350° it's going to take about 55 minutes okay all right so we're going to put all that batter brownie batter right into this pie shelf now you can mix this up this recipe we're going to also add in the chocolate chips got to have some chocolate chips we're going to kind of mix those in a little bit now those will melt into it or they will melt into it y okay we're going to add those right in here toss them all in it's just going to be like a chocolate chip cookie gives it an extra element you know now the reason I added the chocolate chips at the end is you can mix this up you can do white chocolate dark chocolate milk chocolate semi sweet you want to do a peppermint twist they have a mint flavor you want to do peanut butter you can add nuts so with the nut allergy not knowing who is going to eat it in the studio we kind of just kept it simple like that so we're going to take that we're going to throw it right into a 350° oven okay and we're going to bake that away 55 minutes pretty simple sounds good yeah so that's cooking that's siming around the next thing that we're going to do is we're going to work on our brussel sprouts cuz those needs to go into the oven also so we're going to take those brussels sprouts that you have and you're going to throw those right into that bowl so this is about a pound and a half of Brussels sprouts and all I did all I did was let me just grab one is I removed I cut off the stem and I cut them in half and those little leaves believe it or not when they fall off you want to throw those in there cuz they give it a nice little crunch element then we're going to take that olive oil and that little blue cup we're going to add that in there so I'm I'm going to put a little plug in if the if people are seeing this before Thanksgiving the Farmers Market has their indoor market on November 19th and when I was there last year there were a number of venders who had fresh brussel sprouts available for where is this Indoor Farmers Market going to be it happens at the mes don't add that one that's balsamic we add that at the yeah that's all right we're going to add The Panetta though right y so I'm sorry it happens at the middle school okay on November 19th I believe from like 9: to 1 and it's the indoor market so all the farmers that people are used to seeing at the farmers market during the summer are there people who are Artisans so you can start some of your Christmas shopping get some vegetables you know it's the week before Thanksgiving that's great yeah a little bit of salt little bit of salt couple pinches of salt salt over there and then you're going to see a Peppermill right behind those beautiful flowers that bar you're going to put some fresh ground pepper you going turn that around and I like a lot of pepper so yeah grind that up beautiful and then all I'm going to do is I'm going to toss it up if you can pass me that sheet pan right underneath that little um white casserole dish that we have here and again a simple easy dish you know and you can put this right in the oven so you can see we're tossing that Panetta we're toss the olive oil so where do you get your Panetta what's it recommend you know I love you know that one of my favorite places is the Waverly market and him if you ever been there once orce does a really good J over there yeah heard a lot them so you want these to be single layer right cuz you want them you want them Brown you want them to get all crispy and caramelly and roasted right so you can see how beautiful those look and these can go right in the oven that's it just like that all right we going to drop that pop that in the oven simple very simple do that yeah you could definitely do that so that's all set so we've got the oven full of our brownie pie we've got the oven full of our brussels sprouts that's ready finish our stuffing so what we're going to do is we're going to take this bowl of crumbled cornbread and I'm going to it's not too hot and I'm going to take that you're going to scoop that out of there for me okay and then I'm going to have you take that that over there and I'm going to have you mix that up okay I'm going to shut this off so we don't burn ourselves here M oh my gosh what a what a great mixture of Aromas coming from this combination of the sausage and the onions and the celery and the corn and the Firefly's famous cornbread but of course but of course the fireflies famous corn so that's really great so what other things exciting in Ashlin um have I've not been in touch with that you might know that I don't know now I know something really cool that I knew when I went and voted in the primaries um that they're actually putting in solar panels at the high school yeah so we have three solar projects happening here in town the one that's the most visible is at the high school they are putting solar panels over the student parking lot which is the bigger parking lot at the high school and some of the solar panels are up now so if you go up there you actually start seeing solar panels up there that's great we also have the solar panels on the Middle School roof and at the house Street landfill okay there's solars solar panels up there as well yep uh so again just the solar idea is using renewable energy and not having to have as much on you know not using the electrical grid as much and trying to generate some of our owner so how much power do they say that that that those solar panels after the high school will I should have prepared I did not I did not I do not know but I do know that by having it up there it's going to help with our energy costs and our energy use at the high school um that's great and it will tie in because this the high school itself has solar on its roof which is why we're adding it to the parking lot because there already was solar at our high school that's great that's absolutely amazing so that's a great project anything else exciting going on let's see there's some new restaurants opening up soon tell me I didn't know that so Erica's Restaurante is going in at the where old Kelly's and track um it was great I got to meet I got to see the owners they had come before us a couple months ago to get their liquor license to the board of Selectmen I ran into them yesterday and they gave me a quick tour they completely renovated the inside they've painted it they're cleaning everything up they're looking to open at the end of November so a great new Italian restaurant coming to Ashland that's awesome that's great yeah so let's do this okay very important about this stuffing the stuffing is phenomenal you can taste it if you like um there's a spoon right over in that draw um you got to chill this stuffing down right over there before it goes into the turkey now you can take this stuffing and you can put it in a buttered casserole dish and bake it at 350° for about 35 minutes and serve it on the side the turkey that we're making today I stuffed it right in the turkey I love how those juices from the turkey just blend with that cornbread sausage keeps moist isn't that great little spicy a little kick at the end not too much just cuz of the spicy sausage and if you don't like spice you can use sweet Italian sausage that's what you can do instead of the hot italian sausage right you can also use chicken sausage you can use turkey sausage you don't have to have sausage at all the flavor as you said there's that kick at the end but I can just imagine having this inside the turkey and then eating it with the turkey and then the gravy we're going to be making it's great it's absolutely phenomenal so what we're going to do Yan is we're going to let this chill down we're going to take a break okay we're going to stuff a turkey we're going to also make the cranberry sauce and the gravy we're going to let it all finish up and then we're going to serve this amazing holiday meal for you and I sounds good all right I'm Steve you with Yolanda greeves all fired up we'll be right back all right Yolanda we're back gravy time so any great gravy needs a thickening agent and that's known as a r and a r is 50% fat and 50% flour so you can use butter which we have here you're going to take that flour you're going to pour that right in there and we're going to mix that all up yep then we're going to let that cook for about 3 to 4 minutes now if you like a darker gravy you're going to want to make the Rue darker although the darker The Rue the less thickening power it has oh really so like if you add like a Gravy Master or something no no no no no meaning that there's difference when you make a rue it can be different colors this is now called a blonde Rue because the Rue is blond in color as that cooks longer um that gets dark the FL starts to turn dark so if we to make a great gumbo we would use a really like a chocolate R look almost chocolate and color even the color of a copper penny but as you make it darker it does not thicken the sauce as well so you're going to cook that and then I'm going to talk about that stock that we made earlier so this stock we're going to pour off strain it right so we've got the shallots you can see all those fresh herbs we're going to pour that right into this container and that's what we're going to use in the gravy isn't that beautiful wow M smells pom wonderful so that's s you can see now if you like you can take the giblet right the giblet or the giblets and you're going to chop those up if you like gii gravy you can put that right in there okay so my R is getting dark that's beautiful all right now you're going to pull that to the side okay beautiful that's just the way that we want it all right now what we're going to do to that R we're going to add some of this stock you're going to mix that in be careful steamy it's going to steam up oh wow I can feel it yep see how it's thickening thickening thickening beautiful pull that off got that all right so we're going to just let that sit let me taste that and see how we are as far as seasoning do I keep stirring do I have to be concerned about letting it burn or go ahead keep rolling going add some more stock needs a little bit of pepper tell you that salt's good though we've got enough salt in that right now so now we're going to let that simmer we're going to use that we might thin some more out in just a few minutes okay while that's simmering and you're going to let that simmer right there you can put that right on that sheet pan okay we're going to start our cranberry sauce all right so what we're going to do is we're going crry sauce is always good we're going to take our water two tablespoons of water this is a 12 oz container of fresh cranberries only two tablespoons two tablespoons and we take 80% we're going to leave about a half a cup of those berries off to the side okay all right and then we're going to take the sugar and a little bit of salt a little bit of salt and a little bit of pepper believe it or not salt and pepper in your cranberry sauce a little bit just a little bit salt enhances the sweetness so look at that I was going to say that's you want to stir that with that whisk a little bit that's looking marvelous turn that heat down a little bit more to simmer now you know wonderer I've got the rine of a lemon mhm which I'm using a micr pler which we're actually zesting this we want the yellow we don't want the pit that white part inside so just the yellow just the yellow edge of it right what if you don't have a zester like so you can take a potato peeler okay and you can just scrape off you know one little layer um you know meaning with the potato peeler and then take a knife and mince it up fine on a cutting board so the same thing and then we're going to do the same thing with the orange orange yep so we've got a little Citrus rind just like this and why do you add the Citrus what does that do for the flavor it really makes it crisp and it gives a little bit of um fruit to the a little bit of uh acidic flavor to the actual cranberry to cut that tartness it really compliments The Cranberries so we're just going to take this we're going to mix that all up we're going to let thisp and ship yep we're going to let this cook just like this for a couple of minutes this is going to take probably about 10 15 minutes and you're going to see they're going to start to come to a little bit of a boil and then they're going to actually pop okay so the Cranberries is going to pop and those cranberries that we saved at the end M when these are going to pop and they're going to kind of turn into that you know cranberry sauce that used to we're going to throw those in there and we're going to let them cook for just about another 5 to 7 minutes and that's going to give it another texture to that corber sa so you know when you buy in the in the store you can buy the jelly or you can buy the whole berri we're going to have some whole Berry in here also okay okay do you smush once you cuz I've done I've tried making my own cranberry sauce but it's just the water and the sugar and the cranberry I like the flavors that you're adding do you smush it afterwards or you're going to see you're not going to have to it's going to pretty much smush itself okay right is that a cooking term SM SM itself okay well I couldn't have made a better gravy without your assistance so it's really looks great so what we're doing now is we're going to check for the viscosity or the thickness of the gravy and you you want it to you know cover the spoon do you see how that's actually coating the spoon y I like it a little thicker yeah so as we continue to cook this is going to reduce down meaning the liquids are going to reduce and it's going to get thicker so we're going to let that cook for a little bit longer time CU I don't know about in your house but in our house gravy is the most important thing it is my daughter Rachel it's and Carly both of them if I don't have gravy it's you know and Dad it's got to be homeade gravy right of course for us it's my mother-in-law she loves the gravy everything has to have gravy so there's a gravy tell me what you think yeah a little salty a little salty so what we're going to do is we're going to add a little bit of water right CU you know we've added some salt into that stock so we're going to add a little bit of water if you can just pour that right in there that'll be great the whole thing right in there beautiful and that'll work great then we're just going to let that cook and that'll be the perfect adjustment to our gravy and we'll be good to go in just a few minutes now the cranberry sauce as you can see is cooking away and you can actually see the Skins are starting to pop a little bit on some going take a little bit more right so while that's cooking away I'm going to work on this turkey if you can pass that bowl of stuffing that we made that would be phenomenal so the stuffing is all chilled out and now we've got this turkey so this turkey was grind right we had this turkey we wiped out the inside okay took out the gizzard and now we're going to actually use our hands and we're going to actually fill that stuffing now a lot of turkeys are packed a lot of turkeys are packed so they actually take the turkey and they pull the actual skin over that's called trussing the turkey it keeps it together so we're going to leave that so we're just going to rest that up and I'm just going to actually fill the cavity with stuffing and that's the best way to do it is by hand by hand is the best I mean you can use a spoon but you know wash our hands right that's the key you're going to get messy when you're going to get a little bit messy exactly and we're going to push that all the way into the bird now some people don't always like to do homemade stuffing is there other stuffing or other things they can do or of course you can buy this want to push that cranberry sauce up to the front to lower that heat it's the bottom control right over here yolana yep turn it down uh simmer there you go perfect so yeah there's plenty of stuffings that are out there that are available um that you can get um and I you know like the Pepper Farm makes a great one um I know you know my uh my mother-in-law used to love Stove Top Stuffing you can talk about that time so so but you know there's all different kind of stuffing you see stuffings that have chestnuts and you have you know in different styles of sausage all kind the other thing that I like to do is after the turkey is stuff I like to take butter and I like to take butter and I like to put some underneath the skin it's kind of under the skin under the skin it's kind of larding so we're actually taking some butter and we're actually pushing it under the breast Under the Skin so you can actually see and see how it spreads out under there yeah that's going to ask give us some more moisture and you're going to just continue to continue to push butter all the way down the skin just like so and you'll see that it'll spread down there and then you're going to take some butter after and you're going to rub it all over the entire turkey nothing like a little bit of butter no no right so you're going to put some butter we're going to rub that all over then we're going to take some salt and pepper M some kosher salt some pepper and we're going to put that on the turkey and then we're going to place it into a roasting pan at 350° and we're going to tent that with tin foil okay all right and then we're going to cook that for about an hour with the tin foil at 350° oh okay an hour now does an hour no matter what the size of the turkey or no matter what the size of the turkey is cuz we don't want to Brown it too much so I always take it and I always put the tin foil on it for about the first hour okay and then I remove it and then as it continues to cook it's going to Brown up beautifully sometimes you have the tendency where it Browns too much and then this is going to have again we're going to put some kosher salt and some black pepper and that's going to go in a roasting pan Which I'm going to show you in just a minute I'm going to pass that to fipe what's the rule of thumb in regards to how long a turkey should so it usually is like 18 to 20 minutes a pound is usually the way that a turkey is at 350° and then it'll come out hopefully looking like that right so this this a turkey that we made that we made we started this earlier today and you can see this beautiful tur turkey and you can see the stuffing um and and the key is you have to people ask me how long the turkey is and a lot of them have the popup thermometers but the rule of thumb is you got to cook it till it's done that's roasting until 165° that's the temperature that poultry should be at so this turkey is in a roasting pan that actually has a roasting rack L it so this rack actually elevates the turkey above the roasting pan so it actually lets the drippings drip into the roasting pan so you're not actually cooking the turkey in that liquid so it gets crispy all around okay so the flavor is is a little bit crispier that's right little it doesn't have that fat that you have and the key of the turkey is you want to let this rest for a good 20 minutes you want to make sure that it rests because what that does is it takes all the juices and they get sucked back in So when then you slice it if you slice any meat when it comes right out of the oven all the juices you'll see they go all cutting and then you lose all mo right so that's take this turkey right out of here you're going to pull that we're going to put that right over here so we're actually going to take this glass and these drippings right here have a lot of flavor if you see the bottom of this pan right here also y you can see all of the this is see all this all this has a ton of flavor so what you want to do is you can take this pan and you're going to put this on a low heat M right up front and you're going to add some of that stock and water and what we're going to do is we're going to get some of that crispiness with that little um yep we're going to take that and actually what we're going to do is we're going to scrape the bottom of this pan and when we Heat this up you're going to see that this is going to give us a ton of flavor we're going to take some of this out of that pan with a little bit of water if you can give me a little bit more water that would be great so Steve this is a really big kitchen you don't have this size kitchen and you have your potatoes going and your carrots going and mhm how do you do something like this with the pan well for you do not have to do this okay so this flavor this just adds the flavor this is a concentrated flavor from the turkey that gravy is perfect as you know we was we're just going to give it a little bit more boost of homemade flavor it's also that caramelized color right that's going to give us some Darkness that's going to make that turkey gravy a little darker so we're just going to let that cook up and then all we're going to do is we're going to strain that through the strainer again also if you can see the drippings that we took from the pen you can see that instead of using butter in this gravy if you want to you can take skim that fat off of the top and actually use that fat remember we talked about a r 50 fat 50 flour you can use that and make the r that way so there's a bunch of different things that you can do now stir that cranberry sauce you can see it's looking like cranberry sauce right cooking away now what we're going to do is we're going to add the rest of those cranberries okay so we're going to get that extra texture that's going to go in there and we're going to let that cook for a few more minutes yeah can feel the difference we're going to come over here I'm going to check on these brussels sprouts and the pie oo looking beautiful on those brussel sprouts nice what we're going to do Yolanda is we're pretty much done we're going to take this off we're going to add a little bit of this stock but let's finish that up let's take a break we'll get everything together we'll show how to slice up the turkey on Thanksgiving sounds good on the holidays because we know that's a little bit of tricky situation we carve the turkey we'll serve a great meal and we'll be right back with all fired up sounds good [Music] well we're back it all fired up let's wrap this show up what do you sounds good I'm getting very hungry all right so if you can take that cranberry sauce which it is done looks amazing you try it we put it right in that glass bowl The Taste is great the orange and the lemon zest just really add to the flavor that's great yeah so as everyone can see that is beautiful and then of course you can serve it warm you can serve it chill you know most people prefer chill that gravy is done we some of those drippings and we added a little bit of that so it darkened that up gave it another Rich turkey flavor in there beautiful so that's good to go put that while you're doing that I'm going to talk about slicing up the turkey well the first thing we got to do is we got to remove the stuffing so we're going to take that beautiful stuffing out of that turkey look at how moist that is yolana doesn't that look amazing oh wow that is great so we going to get all that stuffing right out of that turkey and the way I don't like that dry cakey stuffing I like some stuffing that has some moisture to it just like this one does that's beautiful and if you do like it crisper you can take it pop it right in the oven and then that's good to go so that's beautiful now everyone ask how do I slice of turkey I break it down in the simplest way possible so what I do is I remove the I remove the leg people like the drumstick right so I have one drumstick here and another drumstick right over here so you cut those separately I cut those separately right off put those in and then I do the same thing with the breast I remove the breast I take the breast and I cut right along the bone if you see the bone that's right here with the knife and I just follow that bone all the way down m i do the same thing this side and I cut it all the way down and I'm following that rib cage and as you can see that whole breast Falls right off of that look at how juicy you see that yeah that ju see that's all from that brine cooked the right way so then you just take the breast Off remove the wings people like the wings you can do the same thing on the other side of the breast right down this side come down the other side you just separate that breast everyone can see that right off of that you have two beautiful loes so you don't the I've heard that you slice it right on the on the turkey I don't I I want to get as much meat off of the bone as I can so that's what I do as you can see it's pretty clean I'm going to show you why in a second then I also do the same thing with the BR with the thigh I remove the thigh right from the turkey everyone can see that right so right see that bone that right there cut right there and I cut that right off on this side W yep and then that comes completely off and then I do the same thing on the other side so take it to the table let everybody see it then take it back to the kitchen and cut it on a cutting board exactly so then what I do is then I this caucus is pretty much good but everyone you got to know that there's a great piece of the turkey on this side does everyone under know know that so that's called the oyster can everyone see that and that little piece of meat that's right here on both side that is phenomenal that is a great piece of turkey so you can cut that out with a bony knife um take that out on both sides and that's a beautiful piece of meat now you can take off the other side just like so see that's why it's called an oyster it looks just like the oyster and then of course there's still a lot of meat if you want to pick and work with all of that and then we take that right out of the way now we're going to move that over to our kitchen sink area and then let's just talk about how we're going to slice this turkey up so as you can see the turkey breast is ready to go and watch how simple and easy this is you just take the turkey breast and you actually just cut just like this so you get beautiful slices oh wow right out of the turkey Some Like It thick very nice it good like that and you get some skin and you get the turkey and then you can just take that on your platter and you can just lay it right out just like this right then the same thing on the other lobe and then you put it right there on the platter and everyone can have some great turkey for the holidays all right the same thing on the thigh the thigh what I do is I do slice this from the bone M right so I actually remove some of the dark meat and I keep it all separate on the platter well I know in our household uh most of the Greaves people like their dark meat so they're fighting for the dark meat so the more we can get cut like this the better that's it so you got all that dark meat and you're going to get all of it right off of the bone you can come right down and that goes right onto that platter right very nice beautiful so you got that all set so now we're good to go yep put this turkey we'll pull it aside I don't have to cut this all up for the platter but we'll have that ready to go we'll remove this cutting board out back sounds good so now Steve we are very fortunate you're cooking this great meal many of us can do this we do have to realize though that there are families here in Ashland that do need our help and fortunately we have the Ashland food pantry who right now is collecting donations for the holidays uh for meals and I would ask that if you have the ability please share some extra when you go to Shaws pick some extra things up and let's get it to those families that are in need it's an amazing thing that we do here in ashin and I really think that it's very important that everyone say you got to give back for the holidays and there are people as you said less fortunate so you know um how how do they where is the food pantry explain everyone where it is what they can do is there any way they can contribute bring food down there how does that all work on and while you're doing that I'm going to pull out this stuff out of the oven yeah okay so our food pantry is located in our community center downstairs um Cara Terrell uh runs it and helps with it so you can contact Cara very often on Facebook she'll post what they're in need of uh you can drop things off they're also looking for donations if you don't want to buy food you can certainly give gift cards to some of our local grocery stores and again any way you can help because the food pantry they service I don't know how many families but it's probably over a hundred families are using our food pantry unbeliev and during the holidays is when they get a lot of attention so we're talking about it now but their needs are constant throughout the year whether it's food for kids for lunch or through the Summers as parents are busy or or they're just in need so they do a great job at our food pantry they really help feed a lot of families and again they take both food donations and cash and um checks and gift cards for different things awesome that's awesome so please contribute to the food food pantry and um do whatever you can this holiday season and again all year year so as you can see those brussels sprouts the amazing can you pass me a spon that we can put that into this dish for a large Serving Spoon large Serving Spoon beautiful and we'll fill that up over here so you can see the the brussel sprouts and the petta got all nice and crispy right separate leaves that you were talking about what a great flavor phenomenal they're going to have make sure you know this we took this sheet pan we covered it in tin foil you don't want to serve any tin foil with your with your BR that wouldn't be good would would not add to the flavor no wouldn't add to the flavor so we've got our brussels sprouts we've got our turkey we've got our stuffing we've got our gravy we've got one more thing we've got to take out of that oven o look at that pie again and there is our amazing pie right they came right out of that oven beautiful brownie pie good to go all right let me make you a plate Tong will be a little bit easier but whatever we you get the point so good then we're going to have a little bit of these brussels sprouts got to have some brussels sprouts brussels sprouts are really good that's it and then of course some of our famous stuffing that you were so instrumental in making this thing happen a little bit of cranberry sauce we'll steal that spoon and then of course you got to CHP it off with some gravy some gravy of course little bit of gravy little bit on everything little bit on it you got it beautiful that is a good look dish wow you pass played I'm going to make myself some too cuz you know all this hard work you you can't let me eat alone no you can't eat alone you can Never Eat Alone exactly so we've got some turkey I'm going to steal that oyster though are you a dark meat person too I like you know I I believe it or not I like it all I mean there's no you know um I do like white meat on the turkey as long as it's prepared the right way there's nothing worse than dry yeah and a little bit of cranberry sauce and a little bit of gravy and we're good to go okay bite let's try I'm going to try the stuffing first okay I want to try the turkey first so you taste that brine in that turkey go that flavor goes all through the turkey yeah it's unbelievable it's moist it's flavorful it really has um some great great flavor I think we might have found a new uh turkey recipe that's it well it's a new T so now let me show you about let me show you we're going to pull out I'm going to this so this one came this one came out of the oven this came out of the oven this one's been chilled down it would be too hot to serve this one so I'm just going to slice a piece of that brownie pie Felipe and I made this yesterday right so you can see how beautiful this voila and then if I could have a little bit of that whipped cream nothing like a little whipped cream and a little powdered sugar to sprinkle it up that's a good looking dessert that looks like a very good dessert even though I butched it with this night but it's still going to taste wonderful so again all the recipes if you want them just send an email to waac TV we'd be more than happy to get them for you again I'm Steve ulis with my great friend Yolanda Greaves it was great having you on the show Steve thanks for having me come and cook with you this wonderful holiday meal and uh I really appreciate having this opportunity to here it was great it was great to learn about all the things that happening exciting in Ashlin again all fired up come on visit me at fireflies whenever you want Yolanda is even there sometime we'll have a couple of sodas with you or a beer maybe or two okay it is the holiday season it is the holiday season T the season might be some hard cider hard side all fired up Steve we'll see you later guys thank you very much Happy Holidays
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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 Ashland Town manager newsletter the Ashland access priority project update the sixth edition of Ashland access is now available this digital publication continues the town's commitment to accessible communication with residents you can view the newest edition online via PDF and even printed at home the local library or the community center some news you need to know the special town meeting recap on November 19th Ashland's special town meeting covered nine articles all aimed at improving Town resources and services key highlights include approval of over $2.7 million and free cash Appropriations to various accounts a $1 million authorization for water main replacement projects updates to property tax exempt ions for seniors effective July 2024 authorization to purchase 52 acres for conservation and Recreation as part of the Town Forest a proposed bylaw on blight was withdrawn while a new zoning bylaw creating an MB community's multif family overlay District passed Clock Town Chronicles podcast catch the newest episode of clock toown Chronicles hosted by Town manager Michael Herbert episode reflects on ashlin's growth over the past decade and explore the challenges faced during the transformative period watch on waca TV holiday Recycling and job opportunities holiday string light recycling don't toss those broken string lights in the trash starting in December recycling boxes will be available at Town Hall and the community center for proper disposal keep an eye on the town of ashen's social media and newsletter for updates on when the drop off locations will be ready thank you for helping us recycle this holiday season some town of Ashland job openings join the team and make a difference in Ashland open positions include Police Department part-time crosson guard the community center van driver after school program coordinator at the DPW water technician 1 and3 heavy equipment operator and check out the full list of openings on the town website some more local job opportunities NEC trophies customer facing role with inventory management and light assembly $20 an hour 35h hour week medical insurance is included contact 508-8811 1551 or NEC trophies at verizon.net another job at michaelj Connelly and Suns hiring school bus drivers with competitive wages and flexible hours learn more at connell.com or call 50866 18153 now for our community shout out today's is going to yuchi coat this week we recognized yuchi coat ashlin's food resource coordinator for her incredible work at the food pantry yuchi has expanded volunteer support improved operations with an online schedule system and enhanced food donations through Community Partnerships her personalized touches like the surprise me options on order forms brings joy to Residents yui's positivity and dedication make a big difference in our community so thank you some upcoming Ashland inent events we have the Holiday Stroll which will be held on Saturday December 7th at 12:00 p.m.
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two years all right uh thank everybody for coming in we're going to call this meeting the BR Bo Regional School District to order uh originally we were uh just scheduled to meet to discuss an executive session issue but um all our athletes apparently do is win so uh there's nobody here to put their hand up for public comment but uh we're going to get into our meeting uh thank you Paul uh after we do the first item which is always the Pledge of Allegiance so please your eyes pledge of to of the United States of America and to the rep it stands one nation God indivisible with liy and justice for all so uh there's nobody here for public comment I know it was short notice but U when did we find out about this uh Matt we found out yeah yeah but we just found out about the game was when Matt yesterday late afternoon yeah okay um all right so before we get into our discussion on uh the Super Bowl and changing the schedule I just want to remind everybody our next school committee meeting while I have your attention is December 10th and uh before that there's actually another important meeting uh for the town of Berlin they have a special town meeting on December 9th that's going to be at the BMS gym at 6:30 there's a couple items on there that might impact the schools as well so you uh check that out and I was told by the uh the PTO group link that they will be providing child care just like they did in the spring uh session so if you're interested in going to that please do go check that out uh so Al we have our um our issue here or not our issue but our item can you give us your uh yep your request thanks so good evening so first I want to take a moment before we go on talking about the boys um in their football team I want to congratulate our girls soccer team right um they are our Central Mass Champions um they made it to the final four um and lost a tough game to Hull with a score of two two to nothing so we want to congratulate our girl so um well done and well done to the coach as well too um so which leads us to our football team and the great news that we found out um so they along with um West Bolston um are in the Super Bowl um we literally just found out yesterday afternoon when Matt and I our athletic director were made aware of the schedule um they are scheduled to play um next Friday um and that is going to be December 6 at 3 o'clock pm at July and I just want to just throw it over to Matt if I could for a second Matt if you could just tell like how do we get to three o'clock and not the six o'clock game and how that all come to to to happen it's I mean I believe it's Lu of the draw haven't said that um generally they reserve the later games for the higher divisions for when it comes to the MIAA and the matchups that they have and again for the state championships in football it's they hope they hold it at chette so there is only certain amount of times that we can have and there are eight divisions they want to fit it in you know again two years ago we were in a 3:00 time slot last year we were in a 5:30 time slot this year one again we're in a 3:00 time slot they have also adjusted the days whereas the two years ago and last year they were more on a Saturday and a Friday might even have been on Thursday a little bit too this year for whatever reason Gillette is not available on that Saturday so the games are now on Wednesday Thursday Friday and there are two three o'clock time slots that need to be filled and it just so happens you know where in that um for other State final matchups or games they are at night it is um or on a Saturday or on a Monday they work around the school schedule but trying to fit games into Jette there is there ends up being a couple of games that fall around around school we we have actually 16 players and the quarterback actually is off from our high school as well too so we're very excited about them um just as all the information I'm going to provide tonight West Wilson I I spoke with them as well too they are now having a half day on Friday as well too so they can release their staff their students and their play is to be able to go to the Gillette in time as well too in a safe manner as well too um I know that this has taken place in the past and actually this will be a treee if the if the kids win on Friday um I know that in the past there was much discussion about how to handle this with regards to school and have famili staff and students attend you know this special event um here's what I'm proposing and I offer that to school committee and and and get your thoughts done December 6th I'm proposing um an early release so will happen is that the elementary students will dismiss at 11:45 a middle school and high school students will dismiss at 10:56 students will have lunch I did speak with the the nutrition manager I did speak with our bus company as well too um this missed instructional time and I know it is missed instructional time it wasn't on our calendar will be made up on Wednesday May 7th and I'm choosing this date Wednesday May 7th that's our uh one of our also release time days um and that's far enough out that we can make the changes we need to make um we can reschedule that professional learning so we we're really pushing that out this will now go from being a half day to become a full instructional day um also I I know and I read some of the emails that you have about half days and the concerns people had please know and I haven't shared with Mike and the school company yet but we've been working on our calendar for next year and the year after next year's is already done um we'll hopefully presenting it at the next school commity meeting I am happy to say whether people agree with me or not but we as a an admin team have come up and there's not there's no half days next year's schedule um on our calendar um but again that's the final voters for school committee to look at but we we have decided as an admin team that we're we're going in a different direction with our Cal and we'll share that with you as well um so with that being said again there there are many options and people certainly have Chim inting as we see from those emails today um The Proposal that I I give to you tonight was we had a zoom meeting today and met with all our principles our assistant principles our directors our nutrition our bus company um all of them are in favor of this proposal um that we will just have a half day on this coming Friday and make up that instructional time in May um other thing I want you to be aware of there's uh time on learning um for middle and high school it's 990 hours of instructional time 900 for elementary um I went back and Revisited that today to make sure that we're going to stay within that we are um certainly something we we want to be paying attention to um Only thing would be concerning if there was a snow day but we make up those snow days in the end so so we are within the the the department of education's requirement for us as well too um the last thing I have to say is I have a parent um information ready to go and with that being said if school committee agrees on this tonight and this is just a proposal you'll vote on um I've already met with uh Paul Mara and it's all set and pretty much locked and loaded for an email to go to parents tonight giving them enough time for until next Friday for people that have to do Family Care Child Care and do everything they need to do as well too so we have everything ready to go depending on the the vote of school commit tonight and with that said that is um my proposal to the chair in the school committee we we spent some time right a lot of instructional time this this last day trying to work this all out but I want to make sure I had all the information I could give to you guys in making your decision thank you thanks congratulations to the team again the girls as well of course before we have our discussion you guys can say whatever you like I just want to as we're having this discussion we got all the emails from everyone emails text messages people in person talking to you your your focus is on attendance this year so why you making this change why are you doing it just for the football team wouldn't you do it for the band or any other group at the school uh why you so many half days it's not good what am I gonna do about family we talk about missing a structural time for the poor performance in the test scor that we see right we got that last meeting great um so we focus so much effort and time on the negatives and trying to fix what's wrong or bring what's low up higher but we have to as a school district probably sell as much as we focus on those lack of a better word you want to call them losses we have to celebrate the successes and the wins too right this is a big Community thing U three in a row is pretty damn good um can't say much more than that so as much as we want to focus on that instructional time this is another day this is going to be like five or six Infinity weeks of half days in a row uh well say terribly terribly done year but uh anyway we we do have to recognize that I mean this is an incredible feat and the success that these kids have had will go on to follow them for the rest of their lives their careers whatever it is and as a community um I hope we can support them and celebrate them as well but there's five of us here tonight so what do you have questions comments you want yeah is there a fan bus so so two things so I'm I'm being very cautious on this whole fan uh fan bus right um it very similar to what we we're doing with the after school programs when we have a half day we we have to sort of remove ourselves and keep ourselves separate from that so if the booster club or something wants to do that absolutely but if it's a school sponsored bus we have to make sure we're taking all accommodations so if a child had need to go in a certain way to get to the bus or had certain issues that we had to or behaviors or one-on ones and there's just a plethora of different things that that could I'm sort of removing myself from from that and as a district I'm that if the booster club wants to do something like that or people in the community want to do something like that that's different but it would not be at least my recommendation is not to be a school sponsored type of fan bus that's taking I asked that because they not being a for transportation limiting amount of students going game I I have a high school age student that's been gone to the game the last two years the first year was on the fan bus it was one bus and it was full but it was still a limited number of students last year there was no fan bus I know my husband has a full car it's going to require a lot of Transportation from parents I just wonder how much what the participation level is we have a number of how many kids actually went the last two years my other question would be to Matt as you talk to all of the coaches that a first week of tryy outs and practices for sports are they planning on having practices Friday we've had this a couple years now so on Friday uh The Varsity Sports will two varsity teams will most likely have their practices around the game and we will cancel the other Tri outs practices for Friday so that we don't have to worry about um we've done it we've had we put a protol in place the last couple years so we won't won't affect with the older kids for trials you say cancel you me reschedule when you say cancel you mean rescheduled it Tri outs for basketball so no right first week no we just won't have that day we won't have practices trials for that day justed for another day I we have a whole schedule in place just that day there won't be the sub varsity teams won't practice okay so what triy out can I just ask re to give a little feedback on about the fan base because I know you go to all the games if that's okay sure yeah yeah um one thing I've noticed I go to all the games my my daughter's a che leader my husband's on the sidelines as the athletic trainer for the football team um I have been very proud All Season particularly this year with not only the amount of Berlin and Boyston not not only high school kids but community members um but also the way the manner in which they conduct themselves um the last few playoff games you've had to purchase through the app um I've worked the gates all of our students are there with their phone you know their phones or their parents are walking them up um I've been very impressed with that and it it was kind of like shocking to me the first couple of games when I'm like these are all our kids these are all our you know what's where and I know a lot of the West boilson families I live in West Boyston you know and and my daughter made a good point she goes well they we there's more West Boyston students that are in the the band so like I'm not seeing them as stands right the West Boon is the band right West Boon is just the cheerleaders that's on a combination team and then you know there's more West Boyston overall players on Bar City this year but um not necessarily on the whole team as a whole it's about half and half um so it's just it's been really nice so um to see and they bring a really positive spirit as far as last year's game I would say gosh I knew almost every single person in that in those stands which means since I know a lot of the West Boon families a lot of those students in families are also from Tanto um so you know it's just it's unfortunate that it's at three o'clock um you know I would me have talked to Matt I'm very also close with the athletic director like he is in West WIS and we can um they are hosting a fan bus which they may be trying to organize I'm sure they will you know we we we may be able to work an arrangement um for us as far as you know not having school sponsored but having that as an option for our students and I believe that's what happened last year is that correct yes and they had one and they then they actually came by here to get some students if we want if they want to be on it they right now they are checking to see if there is an interest in a family at was W they started that today um and even to add to your what you were saying like in wber on Saturday the the amount of fans there and Tanto fans alone it was it was it was a pack Stadium down there it was pretty good and the two times at Gillette you know a three o00 game two years ago it was amazing how many people were there last year at 5:30 there was there was even more and then I stayed for the next game for a division one or a division two matchup and there were more fans there for the game that watched the 530 for us and we traveled so well compared to the bigger game the higher Division and that was at an 8 o00 start so and on they've traveled well and they've got there I mean it's it's unbelievable see just the even at a game at home like you were saying it's just the the fans is we have we do have a huge support from the staff as well on both of the games that you know there was a huge showing from the staff last year before would you say the high school or the elementary I mean there were a few but I mean most of the staff from what I so IES from the from the high school staff but having said that there's all ages there to you know when it comes there there was there's little yeah one of the little guys um from Berlin and Boyston actually I recruited him as a a permanent snap Shack um consultant because he ended up working for us and and getting our numbers up there um and I won't name his name but it was very helpful but yeah one of our one of our families third grader any other questions um what is the possib of splitting like to getting ear release for the kids that don't need after school care versus element kids that do sure so we I also I I misspoke as well too or I didn't speak and say I me with the Union as well too right so that's the other piece that I'm dealing with right so we were because that was an idea that first thought about as well too so if you have a half day just to the high school then those teachers but then there's a half day the teachers in the elementary school is still working a full day right and so then to make up that it it just there's not Equity there and I have to make sure of that as well too so um with this being the release time for everybody it will be both the elementary and in in the high school in the middle of high school as well too so I have to be cautious of the Union as well um two years ago also the propos time was a later time a 1M dismissal to less time learning um espe since being pay takes about an hour to get there um yeah was a superintendent proposed time so I just curious if that was also looked at yeah so the way I'm looking at this time CH sorry is is I'm really keeping to trying to keep to what we've always done in the past also now you have a change in time I mean I'm certainly that's a conversation we could have here tonight I just went with the times that all our other half days or release time days are at um I'm also being mindful of people traveling right so Mom and Dad got to pick up kids I mean even Berlin Bolston those dismissals and it's never really right at 11:45 by the time that last car get get picked up all the kids that are taking the bus getting home and Mom and Dad are meeting them at home getting them in their car and going to it so I just was trying to take the safety Factory to that as well too yeah I guess for a half day right it's 11:45 elementary schools and that doesn't really allow par work a half day um and you know personally I've used up all my time off I'm using CME time to take care of my son who was at surgery yesterday so I think you know and all what five or six emails that we received were we're working parents we can do this you time on learning the kids need to in school so just wondering if we can be more creative in our Solutions um to that yeah and the only thing I went with is being consistent right so all our other half release times days are at that time I just don't want to throw parents off a little bit that's all I thought we had voted I could be wrong I thought we had voted to go with the earlier time because rather than the one release because of the student drivers yeah who go a lot slower and have to navigate a really difficult part on because I remember that being part of my concern having a student driver at the time um so I I don't think we had gone with the one o00 for that La I mean I so first of all I feel like you said a president a couple of years ago when we when we allowed the students to be dismissed early but we keep talking about how we want to build culture we want to boost school spirit I can't think of a better time or place to do it we have this opportunity um I I went to the game two years ago I saw a lot of elementary school teachers there um a lot of these teachers had these students and probably want to watch them play um and I think it's wonderful for staff to be there with students and to be in such a celebratory mode and to see each other outside of the school supporting um I completely empathize with the half day situation but since we're trading it out I understand it gives two weeks to try to to to figure that out but there is time to do it and we're going to be we're not going to be losing the time we're just moving it around um so those are just my thoughts on the yeah so kind of similar to what lari said about the moving it's we're not taking another day where I know it stinks because December is like three half days said an Infinity of the very inconsistent schedule um but then that brings some consistency to May um where we'll have a after April break there's a really good stretch probably until Memorial Day where the kids are in school that's when mcast are so for me I'm like oh well that sounds like a little you know that's what mcast makeups are um field trips there's a lot of stuff going on then so kind of think it I like that that we're we're not not just adding a half day we're trading and you know we I know it's really hard so I do I feel for those parents um I'll be honest I have an elementary age child we have not missed a game we're very good friends with the coach Collin um so we we've gone to all of them my son has had tons of friends there so I do think a lot of kids in elementary school want to go especially little boys that play football or the girls that are interested in football um so I do I think it's important to have that Comm commity Spirit as well and it's just a really really tough situation and um hopefully next year we can think ahead it's always the Friday after Thanksgiving and maybe we don't necessarily have to put something on the calendar but we put like a caveat on there so parents know this could be a possibility I don't know because like I said third year in a row but yeah how are you going to predict they're gonna make it to a Super Bowl three years in a row impossible we never thought and I remember last year vividly Carol Carol yeah yeah Carol was ecstatic when we found out the game was at 5:30 but it was totally Lu of the draw she was like yes I don't have to worry about the half day fight um and unfortunately we locked out this school committee we loed out to make this decision but yeah tough decision any uh any final oh sorry yeah I don't even know if it's a possibility is there a way to not for this year but to reach out to the Emma you mentioned that last year you stay for the game after the 5:30 game in the higher division and L schol attended than the lower you B together with some lower divisions and put some something out there that maybe you deserve I I could try that I've I've also personally went to him last year and this year they're not really listening to me yet maybe if I Tred to band together with some other everyone same price of admission more people that maybe more the only last thing I'd like to say is I think everyone knows I'm not huge fan of the this calendar this year right I I think I pretty much so may is a huge advanced placement exams that's like we we should not be having half days in May right that's where we really need to focus on that curriculum our AP scores I would say are the number one thing that would compete in the entire world for for our kids getting fives and fours and entrances to college and universities we do not want half days on that time so I'm I'm selfishly looking at that may date as well too that we should be in school as well fulltime I know that we made a precedent two years ago but this is also a calendar that we did not have two years ago and this is a calendar that we did vote on to so I think voting an additional half day it's on an additional half day just so what Al's proposing is you make this one on December 6 a half day you remove a half day for May so there's no additional half day just want to make sure everybody's clear it's let's say there's 10 and half days it's not now 11 still 10 it's just the timing is being rearranged so that's a pretty clear distinction because I'm sorry if the classroom time yeah uh any final words if there was a plan B that you guys want we need to work on it like because we spent the day meeting with everyone to make sure that we presented something to school Comm so it wasn't just a random conversation it was more pointed right can I have a a motion to amend the school calendar uh to make Friday December 6 2024 an early release day and to make May 7th 2025 uh a full school day canceling that early release day Meg Lori all right any final discussion I think that as we vote it is a committee you know the will of the committee right and so anyone that votes for or against should not be vilified by the committee um I think we all are for too spirit and spirit district and so that did not happen two years ago and so I think that is a very important point that we all were trying to support the entire District what me yeah I miss that point too sorry um yes so the vote was published on our Facebook page and who voted for and against the half day um and there was quite big backlash committee members backlash yes yes committee members backlash the only one who vote against so I was vilified by voting against it because I because I want the later time and so I voted against the motion I just want to be clear on what you're saying you said committee members vilify committee members I don't remember that happening by publishing who voted what outside of the minutes it created the illusion to anyone that wasn't watching the minutes of them watching it live or reading minutes in total it vilified me for voting against it which my family went we supported we cheered and I used to want to support them but it by Committee Member you abifi the earlier at the later time I don't all right we'll have to talk about that later there was a Committee Member who vilified any other Community member V we're going to have to have some words of that Comm public can say what they want to say about whatever we choose to vote but if a Committee Member vilifies someone for I think there's nuances to the all right so are we ready for a vote all right in favor I yes all right I I love I hear 3 to one you V I said I you said I speak switching for May I don't agree with it but okay all right so the motion passes 4 to1 so just through the chair so Jessica when when you do a vote like this and sometimes it goes four to one knowing that the the majority of the your school Comm has voted in favor the the chair has the right to revote it so you can have a full vote in support of it knowing that the school commit is in favor right now I appreciate okay just one know that there an option for that okay great thank you thanks everybody we have a notice ready to go out tonight so parents will have that tonight and be ready to go so we'll stop giving that information out great thank you thank you three of you guys all right we're going to go into an executive session very much app very much I have a motion please to enter executive session pursuant to Massachusetts general laws chapter 38 section 21A purpose 3 to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation KS bbrc if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigating position body the chair second second all right roll call vote Jess Megan hi and I as well okay we are now in executive session thank you Paul Paul would it be um all right
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to 400 p.m. in downtown Ashland enjoy festive fun with 25 plus local vendors giveaways food from doron eery and marshmallow roasting visit Santa and Mrs Claus at The Corner Spot the annual tree lighting will be held on Saturday December 7th from 400 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. at Mont Square celebrate with caroling hot cocoa cookies and the official tree lighting at 4:30 p.m. Santa will arrive for visits and letters can be dropped in a Santa shed mailbox the aps fall band and coral concerts Friday December 6th 7 p.m. at Ashlin High School experience an evening of exceptional performances by ashlin's bands featuring works by Bach Le plant and more the Ashlen Music Association winter Fair will be held on Friday December 6th from 6:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at Ashlin High School enjoy games crafts food and live music including a reading of The Polar Express at this familyfriendly event mark your calendars and join in the holiday festivities some Ashlin Community updates the Ashlin police department will be having a toy drive from now until December 11th support the Marine Corps Reserve Association by donating new unwrapped toys at the Ashen Public Safety B building the holiday Boutique will be held on Saturday December 7th from 12:00 p.m.
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to 400 p.m. at the Federated Church 1:18 Main Street stop by during the Holiday Stroll to shop for goodies and treasures at the Federated Church's holiday Boutique today's episode I will be dedicating to Steve Ulus a true Pioneer and a remarkable person whose Legacy will never be forgotten Steve wasn't just the owner of fireflies barbecue he was a friend mentor and a hero to so many of us his passion for food and and Hospitality transformed the barbecue scene in New England introducing a level of Excellence that changed the way we experience Southern barbecue and I can attest to that Steve's kindness dedication and work ethic were unmatched he always put others before himself whether it was his family his staff or his community his warmth and generosity touched the lives of everyone he met and his memory will continue to inspire those of us who are fortunate enough to know him this episode is just a small way to honor Steve's incredible impact on the people around him and I am so deeply grateful for the time I had to learn from him and work alongside him Steve you will be missed but your legacy will live on in every dish every smile and every person you touched thank you so much for everything you gave to us rest in peace Steve you are already missed so much thanks to everyone for tuning in today and I would just like to say good night and go clockers
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welcome staff stakeholders parents and anyone watching on YouTube Welcome to our December superintendent update uh again we're very thankful for all the rain that we had in November hopefully everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving and we're welcoming back to finish up the first semester strong and getting the second semester uh started very quickly so again every time that we uh have one of these updates we really want to focus why are we doing this uh what are we doing and then how are we actually going to achieve this and so what we're going to really focus on this month is that we put together a self phone committee a cell phone committee uh is making recommendations to the school board and the administration as to a potential policy uh that they'd like to have enacted for the following school year so uh this really helps us focus in on strategic plan four where we want to make sure that we have some consistent relevant communication as well as we're developing deep relationships and engagement with our uh stakeholders so we had three parents three staff members and three students um the parents were selected by uh they filled out a Google survey U Back early in the year and and we had a handful of parents that requested to be a part of that and we we took three parents that represented a cross-section of parents uh in the ages of the students they had in the district um as well as what their feelings are uh towards in incorporating this policy uh we also selected uh three staff members one from each building and then we selected uh three students one from the middle school and two from the high school uh to serve on this committee and I will say that uh as a group all of us that have met we have been very very impressed with our students that have been part participating um not only can they articulate their position very well um their position may be surprising to a lot of adults their position believes that when uh teachers are teaching we need to put the devices up and that the devices can be distracting and they can overall be harmful at some point in time uh with our students and so uh we got some really good feedback from them on helping us uh develop some recommendations uh so kind of what are we going what has been done and what are we going to do so back in June the USD 264 Board of Education requested that we kind of put in a cell phone policy and before we put in a policy um that would be kind of reactive to the the needs in the moment uh we really wanted to understand the why and so part of understanding the why was putting together this committee U so that we could get a cross-section of voices and we could get a multitude of opinions on uh what are things that are going well what are things that aren't going well and how can we better manage uh personal devices or cell phones going forward at the same time ksde and the Kansas State Board of Education formed the task force to study screen time uh and its effect on students as a district we had to report uh how much screen time each day that each grade level was probably getting on a device as well as what our policy was um regarding cell phones so then next we formed this Committee of the parent staff and students we've met twice we've got one more meeting coming up uh just later this week the first week in December and we're working on making three recommendations uh to the administration the school administration principal superintendents and the board as uh these be the components of a policy the first one is a gradual release of personal device use with consistent accountability uh what that really means is that kindergarteners yeah we shouldn't have devices at all we shouldn't have them at school if they do have a device uh keep them at home um but make sure that there's some consistent accountability as we get into intermediate and middle school there's going to be this gradual release of maybe they're able to use it before school and after school but during the school day it'll be in their locker or locked up all day long and then as we get into the high school being able to have the students have the devices um during passing periods and at lunch before and after school but though those phones would be either put up or would be placed into a safe location um during uh class time so what would be called a bell-to-bell policy uh the second thing is that a proactive education on device uh management and how we receive information so one thing that really came out of this from both the students and the parents was how are we as Educators training or teaching our students uh in conjunction with the parents on how to best use the devices when and where um similar to hey if you're at the dinner table should you have your device out or can you put it up and be able to have a conversation with someone uh setting across from you um also the second part is understanding that when we live in a world of U social media like we do and having instant communication is that information reliable and how can we at the school setting help um students understand how to decipher whether information is real or if it's misinformation and how to ask questions to better be good consumers of that information then lastly uh we wanted to put together a student advocacy group and this group will really be helping be a liaison for the administration and students on personal device use and so being able to have constant uh direct communication with the administration on what is going well what's not going well how uh can they help and also are things working um in in doing those pieces so kind of our when or what are our next steps and what are our some of our timelines and so we're going to take those recommendations and finalize some of the language around them in December and we're going to present those recommendations to the administration in January in January and early February the administration will work on writing what would be an official policy and an an official policy language at the March board meeting we will take that policy to the board to have a first read meaning they're going to just read ask questions and ask for any revisions and then in April will be the second read and then we'll make an action item to approve that for the handbook starting in the 25 uh 26 school year uh also both of our students that have participated in all the meetings they are planning on uh presenting they want to be a part of that and helping the administration draft the language as well as present to the school board so we're excited that those students are taking on that kind of Civic engagement and getting involved with the policy writing uh process so as we kind of move into this uh when we're thinking about B1 degree more within this area is how can we as staff and stakeholders and parents start having conversations with students about appropriate use of Technology uh we are not Banning technology we're not Banning cell phones what we want to be able to do is we want to be able to start having conversations of when and where is the right time to use them and how can we help model that as adults for our students as well so again anytime you want to reach out and have a conversation we'll always gladly uh sit down with you so either send an email uh find me on Twitter or you can call the office and schedule of time to come in and visit we look forward to uh getting the first semester completed and starting off the second semester it's been a great year so far and we're ready to make uh second semester even better thank you
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e hello everybody and welcome to the 77th annual holiday parade here in downtown Beverly my name is Al tempkin I will serve today as your co-host along with my formidable partner Francine tkin so if you haven't picked up on it yet we are related we are married and um and I am the boss and she is the boss here today so I'm strictly following orders and uh we are getting close to 120 now the parade as most of you probably know kicks off from the high school at 1:00 and so it should be right up along here uh any any moment now we certainly will hear it before we see it as there are a lot of fire trucks and big trucks that come up um come up ahead of time so uh little change this year as well we we in the past uh many many years we've been in front of City Hall uh doing this parade and this year because the Bev cam offices have moved right here uh downtown here Beverly on on Caba Street we decided to move this this broadcast down in front of their offices makes uh setting up a lot easier a lot simpler and um and it's just kind of an easy change so here we are and um I'd like to just kind of thank some people and introduce you to our sponsors before we kind of get this broadcast underway and so first and foremost we want to thank our sponsors which include the Northshore Bank it it includes mcj Insurance Agency lesie sray Insurance Agency Sterling Insurance Agency Institute for savings Salem 5 marel head Bank tempkin Financial Group you might recognize that name again and Blink Fitness this year has joined us as a sponsor and we really appreciate their sponsorship we also want to thank um bevcam and medley Creative Group thank you so much we certainly do especially bevcam in in the sense that you bevcam as you all know does a wonderful job for us they're wonderful to have in our community and they do a great job with this parade so we really appreciate it uh and medley Creative Group medley long who will be sitting on the back of of one of our convertibles here today representing Beverly 400 and we'll talk more about that in a little bit also want to thank the Beverly Police Department uh for those of you that are out here on the street watching this another day you'll see all a lot of police presence blocking streets off doing what they do to keep us safe and they do an amazing job we are so lucky here in the city of Beverly to have our Beverly to Police Department on our team I worked very closely and directly with Sergeant Dana Nicholson and let me tell you he is a gim we are really lucky to have him on our team and and I really appreciate working with him he's a good good good guy also want to thank our parade committee which consists of a group of people many of the names that you will recognize John Kenny uh Steve Crowley councilman Steve Crowley Ray Novak many of you know Ray is uh from his days back at the high school working with the band uh Linda turot uh she's a realtor here very well-known realtor right here in the city of Beverly and all throughout the NorthShore and uh Connor and Chris Mooney from Sterling Insurance work with us on our committee and we're we're very very lucky to have them and so that's a list of our sponsors we'll we'll probably thank them again as time goes on and uh we we can't do this without them because um although this is not what you would call a pricey kind of parade or program we do need some money to to to make this thing work so we appreciate our sponsors and any of you that would might want to get involved with us either as a sponsor as a donator or on our committee uh please look us up uh Beverly parade ble holiday parade.
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org and um and let us know that you're interested and we'll reach out to you and and U and have you join us so if I can oh look who's here who's here my my daughter my son-in-law my grandson is here uh so yeah they're going to going to be watching the parade from uh from right behind us here and um so this is uh this is our second year working together here and uh so so Francine has taken over the show and uh with that you're up no but it's so nice it's like when you see the kids come and our kids all grw up in Beverly and now our grandchildren are in Beverly it's really a wonderful Community I was talking to somebody earlier and they just moved into Beverly during covid and she says this is such a close community and I'm like no no it's a wonderful community and people stay and that's why we do so much in the city of bevly so it's like it's I can't I can't imagine another Community like this our daughter lived in New York now in Connecticut our other one and she said she doesn't meet people that in a community like what we have here so we are very very lucky with all that and look at the crowd today um Alan yeah there's a there's a is fantastic yeah well it's a it's a great day I mean it's a little little nippy out here but um but it's not raining it's not snowing and uh my grandson's having a wonderful time so um and I'm going to introduce you to him so um but yeah Beverly is a great community no question about it we got great leadership here in Beverly and um excuse me for one second what can we see them no and this is Jackson what and he's seven months old it's a viewing stand for the politicians if they choose to stand on there what do you think yeah yes um Jackson JD what's up man so um but it really is a great community and and um and I'm so happy and I'm I just want to say congratulations to our teachers and P Professionals for having worked through that uh that issue recently and it it appears I haven't seen a lot of details but it does appear that things worked out for them and that's the way it should be so uh we appreciate them we're so glad that things have worked out and we so appreciate all the great work that our teachers and our administrators in our city and our parents do for for our kids so uh and we have two children that uh that have gone through the Beverly school system we have uh our three granddaughters are now in the Beverly school system uh our twin granddaughters are at the Cove Cove school and uh they absolutely love it there and our older uh granddaughter is now in middle school and she absolutely loves it there so uh again congratulations teachers you got what you deserved and and we're so happy for you we we are so happy it's so nice that the kids are back to school life can get on and um we are just thrilled for all of these teachers yeah crazy crazy crazy times and all that so is good and we have wonderful things to look forward to yeah for sure and that's you know it's just uh you know it's it's it's kind of sad that you have to go through a process like that um but it's something that we have to do and and and sometimes be reminded that we we need to recognize certain elements of our community in in a bigger way um because they're just so important but you know what else too Ellen our kids our grandkids learned a lesson if you need something you can work for it and the idea that let's have a discussion what's needed so it's not like sitting back so they saw their teachers who they support and love who are wonderful to the kids to be out there for them and that was wonderful that the kids and the parents all supported them a great learning experience I agree you know I think and and I know that uh that our daughter really uh communicated with our granddaughters about what was happening why it was happening what it means and yeah I think I agree I think that was um that really was a great learning experience and too bad we had to go through it but it was a good learning experience yeah and everybody understands uh why it was necessary and and but the I guess the the key to to those kinds of events is that the outcome was terrific and and and it worked out great and and we all continue to support our teachers and our parents and we just hope that we don't need to go through this again a few years from now so keep up the good work teachers keep up the great work Paris and uh we're on your team we are on your team awesome awesome so we got yeah we got a real crowd uh we got a we got a grinch coming down coming down the way here yeah we got uh we got a we got a grinch yeah nor Shan nor Shan are right here oh very nice they're going to be singing for us the nor Shan are going to be singing for us Grinch yeah yeah lovely yeah wonderful perfect perfect perfect very good the ni shman yeah they do a great great job they they show they've been showing up with us for the past few years they're a wonderful group of guys and and they do a wonderful job and and entertaining us and singing with those beautiful voices and um and you know what I'm I am I don't um um do you want them to you no they they won't see you they won't see you oh they won't see you um so um yeah so it's all good I'm actually hearing some some of the uh some of the sirens right now yes yeah so um so they should be coming up very very short um so no you know something and and the kids get so excited with the big trucks and all that which is wonderful oh we have the nor um y shman singing right now and nor sh is singing right behind us here yes can you hear them this is fantastic the police officer just coming right now making sure the streets are clear we all know the great job wait a minute there is Mr Ray Novak I think we all know who Ray [Laughter] is where you going [Music] so you're not going to see anything from there you want to get in front or get in back [Applause] do you do you care yeah and I can hear them coming now so they should be up in front of us uh anytime as as a matter of fact I can tell you I can tell you right now that you're going to see police cars now you're going to see the Beverly Fire Department which as you know our chief is uh Peter o Conner uh Peter does a wonderful job with our fight apartment keeping us all safe and it is the mission of the fire department to provide highquality fire protection and Rescue Services to the citizens of our community and boy do they do just that they do a wonderful job and we're lucky to have them you're also going to see the Salem Fire Department here um Chief Allan Dion uh that also does a wonderful job in the City of Salem uh they're going to talk about they're going to bring through their brand new 20123 Pierce fire ladder truck and in Salem the ladder trucks also carry heavy rescue equipment needed at Automotive accidents Technical Resources uh technical rescues and anything that might require a powerful saw or hearse tools Salem and Beverly regularly work together at major accidents whether they're in Salem OR in Beverly you're also going to see Grampy Ed's fire engine Judy and Ed it's a familyowned ranger fire engine the new whip switch they're here every year and they've been for several years but this year they're honoring gry Ed who enjoyed his last parade in 2023 Here's to You gry Ed wow very nice the ipswitch fire department is joining us with engine five bport ambulance will be here service based in gler Massachusetts to disco Services uh Pat to disco full service Towing transportation and vehicle repair company with locations in Salem pey East Boston and Roxbury they also have a use pot and Salvage facility in Salem New Hampshire you'll also see the Beverly the Beverly Department of P please so please uh don't uh don't be sharing any information here that we're not supposed to share it's a very it's a big this is awesome you're probably not going to be able to hear us because here they come now yeah so just watch what's coming [Music] through really you need some help but they work so hard they work so [Music] hard I wonder how our grandson's doing with this right now [Music] B fire rescue coming up car two here's the Beverly Fire Department right [Music] [Applause] [Music] here man these trucks are so big [Music] [Applause] [Music] that's Renee that's my [Applause] hair here comes the Salem fire department now they're coming and these these guys have been working so hard with all these bus fires 91 that's the new truck that I mentioned earlier that's a beauty wow beautiful the 2023 ladder truck from Salem and again as I mentioned they they work with B in times when necessary wonderful so it's great to have that resource available if we need it oh to look at these faces of these kids it's really unbelievable a Linfield fire apartment right here this is Linfield oh something from Linfield here standom people on top yeah Linfield joining oper today exactly it's awesome and his vport Ambulance Service coming up right [Music] now look some great music Beautiful they got some great music on this this one yeah oh and it's all decorated look at the back [Music] the Christmas tree can I sing Oh don't sing please don't sing oh hit to disco hit the Disco trucks right now alen oh beautiful music listen to the music that is awesome wow look at these tracks [Music] wow we have granddaughters and these loud trucks they don't like I love this we actually asked to disco to not bring as many trucks this year they always bring six or eight trucks um so we we asked them to cut it back a little bit this year so but the kids sure do love them yeah they're they're they're big trucks and that's the and that's the reason why we can't have candy being thrown you get a little kid running out in front of one of these trucks you're not going to see [Music] them oh oh here comes the it fight apartment [Music] oh that would be fun to ride on top Wow Let's wave very cute very very cute [Laughter] [Music] he needs to be up [Music] here up here if Swit oh it's great it's all you know it's always great to have to have other cities kind of joining us and op parade to to to be here look at the little kids in the back adorable keeping nice and warm yeah the up switch trucks this is awesome and they think we're famous so that's pretty good yeah they do they think we're famous yeah we're I think we're going to be we're going to be [Music] [Applause] seeing right now [Applause] no city of Beverly Public Works how helpful are they they're just a just another great organization in our city very helpful to all of us and uh just a great just a great crew run by I believe it's Mike Collins [Music] oh city of bever all I know these are big trucks big trucks all decorated and this is all Public Works Public Works trucks with elves and stockings y oh all public works is still coming along [Applause] I didn't realize the Public Works had this many trucks whoa what is this Alan is this glove's um regimen um no no good is this wow looks like a big [Laughter] [Applause] snowblower oh look at this this the season what is Alan what is that I and there snow coming through coming down yeah it's going to be it's going to be a white Christmas it's going to be a it's well it's going to be a white parade it's going to be a white Christmas I love this it's going to be a white parade [Music] wow grounds division beautiful hi guys Merry Christmas hi Merry Christmas just great yeah we should be seeing I think the the glove's regimen coming up pretty soon not yet I don't think we still have many trucks yeah I love the snow the kids are getting so excited with the snow it's an alen look at this oh we have like a little gingerbread house hey which is great thanks I'm up [Laughter] here oh look at this one the Snowman on the front the tires oh yes oh and he's scooping he's scooping presents probably going to bring him up to the North Pole up to Santa absolutely yeah no more presence here wow that's the Glover regiment okay yeah you you might want to you might want to Here Comes the Glo I'll do that here comes the Glover is um marel Hood regimen it portrays the original 1776 uniform Marblehead lovers served the re Revolution on three occasions in it's going to be followed by uh what's that the sheriff the yes so the Essex County Sheriff's Department the honor guard will be coming we can hear them and I'm sure you'll hear the rifles go off yeah here they come right now right yeah [Music] okay get ready I think it's going to happen here it goes block your ears did you hear it ladies and gentlemen if you did not hear that please go see your doctor immediately man that was loud [Music] true the uniform yeah back in uh back in the day again original 1776 unit from mobble head they saved the revolution as Francine said on three separate occasions in 1776 it's unbelievable it's amazing but they've been they've just worked with us in this parade now for it has to be I'm going to say four or five years something like that oh so get the holiday parade and what's coming right now Alan the American Legion Bly fight bment colors yeah y yeah Massachusetts colors all right yeah and then coming up we have a banner from what's that Banner pel Sheriff's Department this is the sheriff's department Sheriff's Department yes sherff Department this is the honor guard this is the sheriff's department Honor Guard Y which has gone by look great and they and they dress blues and look terrific with Captain Shelley Heathers I love when uh any of the law enforcement people go by and I don't know them I think that is the same thing I'm glad I don't know them that's really good I'm doing the same thing oh here's the Grand Marshall which is medly long actually the Grand Marshall this year is Beverly 400 with JY Wallace leading the back here um is Beverly 400 so Beverly 400 400th birthday is coming up in 2026 and we have a committee right now hi guys nice car nice car nice car you perfect we've planned it well we planned it well thank you I I had my sweater on but I'm but I'm freezing so I I have my coat on oh you were smart oh that's great so yeah so the Grand Marshal this year is bever 400 which uh the the 400 uh birthday is coming up to commemorate the city's Rich history we celebrate and embrace its diverse community and inspire a collective vision for for future centuries BBY 400's goal is to create a robust multifaceted slate of events and recognition to commemorate Beverly's 400th birthday throughout the year 2026 so join them online Beverly 400.
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org 400. org Beverly Beverly 400. org to get more information it's going to be a lot of fun we're going it's going to be a lot of fun and um uh we got a bunch of wonderful events scheduled for 2026 with the kickoff being here today um so please make sure you jump on the website and learn more about the Beverly 400 the our birthday coming up we are rich in history I will tell you that here in Beverly so and now we have coming up um thank you sir [Music] thanks oh this was great this is uh another Public Services truck with a band on the back of it and this is the Beverly 400 birthday cake right here so right here we're we're wishing Beverly a very happy birthday coming up in 26 and this is fat Martin and yeah Pat Martin where's Pat where's Pat oh she must be on the other side of the car senior senior of the year that's our senior of the year yeah very nice Patricia Martin for all the great community service work that she does here's our junior junior King and Junior Queen from Essex County soon to come is Mrs Essex County here she comes she should be yes Stewart is um Mrs xus County 2025 will be instrumental in the Essex Agricultural society's goal to educate the public regarding the organization's importance through several agricultural events and there Mar and joy with M and joy is there and uh a special thank you to Thad sasco for letting us use his beautiful Mercedes-Benz convertible uh during the parade here today so we really do appreciate that Dad um coming up shortly you're also going to see the Beverly human rights committee the Beverly human rights committee seeks to seeks to thank you seeks to enhance Equal justice inclusivity and human rights for all members of our community wait a minute look at this little Polar Express look at oh adorable oh so creative that's fantastic that is just great Polar Express is back at the cabin on Sunday December 8th The Polar Express is on the big screen all in support of the Isabella Marino charitable fund and the kids at the cabit make sure to wear your PJs tickets are on sale now at ww.the cit.
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org thank you to Josie and Rich Marino for bringing this special day to our community and Alan I grandkids have gone so many times to see The Polar Express at the cabin and they have a blast it's just so magical it is it is wonderful and uh Beverly bootstraps truck is coming by right now uh the Beverly bootstraps we all know is is an organization that uh really does so much good for our city and for those in need and we want to be sure that we help support them in every way we can in fact we're collecting uh perishables here today uh that that um uh that Beverly bootstraps will will provide thank you Scott hey Mike yeah yeah we've got a couple of our councilors here our mayor is walking the streets right now which is just great really appreciate that uh Matt s ha Mayor Mike uh Scott hman is here and um this is just great and now we have um we have oh this is more of our more of our city councils I think oh look at mac and cheese how are you hey Julie how are you great job great job city council president Julie flowers is coming by on the mac and cheese truck right now raising uh generating some food for uh which will be given over to I think Beverly bootstraps um so oh okay oh here's the um the our letter our letter carriers like I'm kind of cold our faithful letter carriers ensure that letters to Santa are swiftly delivered to the North Pole no stamp is required just hand your kids to a uniformed um post office service be sure to include your return address and Santa is going to reply so this is very excited and you see all the postal workers outside collecting letters for Santa oh there's probably about 30 of them ah come on kids give your lce to Santa you got to you got to if you don't give your letter you can't get a return give you boys and girls wow here's the Beverly midd School band these students are grades 6 through 8th here they come and it's just so exciting that they are able to come come and marching the parade after being on strike for almost 3 weeks so hands off to them fantastic wonderful good job [Music] [Applause] [Music] guys it's it's amazing to see what happens from middle school and then they go to the high school B it's just incredible to watch Beverly Freemasons are coming up right now Liberty Lodge proudly serving the city of Beverly since 1824 the Liberty Lodge is dedicated to Brotherhood charity and community service thank you Masons oh thank you and here comes the dancing witches of the northeast of Massachusetts inspired by the original wolf shagger exob brat of Germany look at those witches be careful They Don't Put a Spell on You are you concerned that they might I am not concerned at all that might work out good for me o and here's our twirling team this is our Starshine twirling team with Erica Clemens the Starshine twirling team is a group of local baton pearlers from across the NorthShore and they're all dressed up in little hats and pink shorts pink pants and they look adorable they they look great they look just great and they are little munchkin they are doing a great job wh and they're throwing those batons up in that air fantastic and coming up you're going to see uh Beverly veterans Council thank you for your service Beverly veterans Council working on Veterans issues and organizing support groups always doing great great work for our veterans who so well deserve it and then we've got the uh Vietnam veterans very also joining us very than you thank you thank you yes Beverly Vietnam veterans right here that's great so happy to see them here I think we've got the uh Beverly PE the Elks Lodge coming up El Lodge coming up right now yes which our contact for that is joore I've known joore for probably 4 years long time yeah yeah speak of the devil Jo Mor who how are you buddy you look good you look good you know when you've been in B for so many years and you're still involved in the community it's nice when all of a sudden let Joe the amori family is a big family here in B Joe's a great guy oh look at this trolley on this is a Salem Trolley Salem the Salem is this a Salem F Bank maybe no Salem Trolley Salem Trolley yeah there you go beautiful hi guys Salem Trolley that's great and we're going to have uh Sal five Bankers coming up oh that's the that's the PE uh Beverly Elks that just went by okay constantly at work donate to the homeless Recovery Center very active in helping veterans they organize a backpack drive for children a hoop shoot and a soccer shoot for the kids many scholarships as well so they're just a wonderful organization the is still coming with a purple truck oh and there's a little moose on top of the truck see the moose I see the Moose you see the Moose who we have all these motorcycles oh look at everybody's all dressed up for the holidays look at the little booties that she has on oh that's so cute very cute we have like the best seat in the house that's we certainly do yeah we really do this is all part of the O they do a great job beautiful all part of the O very involved organization very involved oh now here comes the Salem Five okay saifi Bank uh Mr Brad hunt a fellow rotarian and a wonderful Wonder guy commun very Community oriented and S 5 is proud to support the holiday prade and they do so every single year really lucky to have them really lucky to have them involved with us hi guys oh with all there's a dog on that float with little munchkins oh Salem High School Marching van Salem High they come every year to join us they earn their first in school history gold medal at the Massachusetts instrumental and coral conductors Association State finals and having also placed first in the division 3 New England Scholastic band Association championships wow these guys do some good stuff huh [Music] it does really put you into the spirit it really does yeah they do a great job yeah year nothing like a good Christmas Carol right and this year Hanukkah is starts the same day starts on the 25th so Hanukkah and Christmas actually go together this year we got the official Salem High School Marching Band official vehicles coming by here which is which is good and um and uh oh our names are on the screen here now that's kind of cool uh oh but they did put my name first I what's up with that I think yeah I think Chris hary you're in big trouble now don't you think I should guys I think I should be first oh look at this here's another trolley is this this might be the uh Campbell Funeral Home trolley I don't I don't think Campbell funeral they don't have a trolley oh okay I don't that would be how are you John same to you same to you thank you hi everybody season's greetings that's a party it is it is Campbell funeral home oh okay Campbell funeral homeall familyowned and operator proudly serving ner communities for more than a century Campbell has been here forever andr and this is the current uh the new current uh existed living in Memory Care community um right up here behind us they did a great job with that building beautifulob I went to Northshore way back when and that was the NorthShore Community College building that I when I went to school there and here's M Cuts these guys go and they they'll cut your hair um they'll come to you and cut your hair which is just great Eric Kagney operates a unique mobile barber shop on Wheels wow so kind of a talk about a unique uh talk about a unique [Laughter] love it love it love it love it um so yeah so they come they'll come to you and then they'll cut your hair so but the woman who cuts my hair is standing right across the street over here she run she owns uh a beard main right up here on ran tool Street a wonderful facility as well to to uh to get a haircut uh get a shave you can actually go and get a manicure a pedicure there if you wanted to Al prob to spend the day Emanuel per Pereira electric just went by uh they are Beverly's prier electrician among the LA Shore and Beyond I think here comes the New England Sports League I think coming up I'm going to wait till till I see them are you man I told him you should W log underwear I don't think he' listen to me New England Sports league is a local co-ed you Sports League you don't have to stand there if you don't want to you're you're oh oh okay good okay okay that offers a unique and exciting Sports Experience for athletes AG years old whatever you want to do good good look at that okay so these are kids 14 years old and it's the New England Sports League New England oh look at this look at this little red um Jeep coming up this B same to you same to you I love that oh look at this look at these kids we have grinches and snowman look at we got we got some oh some bad dudes coming up along hand adorable she looks like princesses they are adorable that's the Dance Academy maybe is that what that is no I don't think so no me either this is BET F be best fitness I used to talk before I was numb Best Fitness is dedicated to helping you achieve your health and wellness goals through state-of-the-art facilities expert trainers nutrition coaching and a wide range of fitness programs with amenities in the largest weight floors in the area who took Studios like hot yoga and especially classes for all levels and we had them all dressed up as witches and we should have uh at M and Sons I don't know how to pronounce I'm so sorry I don't know how to pronounce the name wow and it's snowing again on C it's a big truck it's snowing again oh here we go here comes the snow over 50 years of site excavation industry as well as Cemetery care services the children on the float are from the north b elementary school hi guys North Beverly Elementary yay thanks teachers [Music] thanks oh the teachers in the in the P this group is wonderful oh oh you would like this I'm coming with you that is [Music] adorable hi wow very nice happy birthday 400 this is uh the truck commemorating Beverly's 400th upcoming birthday as I mentioned earlier in 2026 uh we're going to have a year of our festivities it's going to be a fun fun year so please check us out on uh Beverly 400.
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