sir yes rich sorry just a building question for the break I I think I put in any meal are we planning on taking basketball hoops or locking dumpsters or anything to discourage people from going on property question I don't know about locking trash cans that's something we've never been I think oh I'll mention the rich I haven't I don't think we've had an issue but what the week off and people bored we we need to be mindful as I'll mention it to him thank you people will be wrong no usually a way during spring break and they're you know without anything to do you know we just got just got something to dad sent an order from the Commissioner unclarity because they've been questions throughout Connecticut about his executive order on social distancing and local boards he made it very plain that although they determined that schools were closed they didn't determine who were which buildings gonna be closed or facilities so one of the things that I'm just thinking as you mention it with social distancing and I haven't had any feedback there's no coaching going on so I know there's no athletics at least in scholastically someone can walk come out with their youngster shoot some Rockets but I'll mention it to Richard the custodians I think Kim is on and Courtney we're closed down right for everything just can I just double checked with you guys yeah the custodians are just doing yeah they're just doing their you know building checks and as we need them they're opening the building if we needed for some specific purpose but there's a night yeah during those buildings actually Carol and chicken very rare yeah anything going on with but I'll mention to him thank you thank you thank you mr.
kaylis are you doing governing board updates or do you need to up so we're going do you want to go information yes d1 would be the next item on all right sorry about that thanks for keeping my on track all right well go ahead move to action discussion item g1 actually I'm sorry d1 alright let's go ahead and go action item d1 superintendent update dr. Kellis Thank You mr. present members of the board and members of cabinet as we have embarked now we're in the middle of our second week of instruction we have taken on a lot as a district as has education districts and other organizations throughout the entire country during this crisis and I just want to take a minute to commend all of the Dicer staff for the extraordinary work that they are doing we have seen where other entities have said that you know the years are washed and we can't do anything that's not the case for Weiser and I so we are sticking to our commitment to fulfill our educational obligation to our students by continuing instruction in the meaningful and relevant manner and what that means is that we are still open for business we are closed but not closed we're continuing remote learning and it's happening in a very meaningful way and I just want to thank all of the staff who are doing such a great job in doing that second thing I wanted to share is that budget has had the opportunity to provide some community service this last week and in doing so has really stepped up to the plate when it comes to jumping into an opportunity that nobody expected we received information about a project from a boy scout in Canada and it was to print 3d three-dimensional prints of an ear guard which allows healthcare professionals to wear their facemask their surgical masks without irritating the backs of their ears because of the straps I will share that we charged we challenged our district community to print a thousand of them and this week and we printed over a thousand of them in just 48 hours and starting today those those those ear guards were being delivered out to hospitals and put it into the hands of nurses doctors and other healthcare professionals the response was overwhelming the gratitude was extraordinary and we have received a request for more up to over 3000 as a matter of fact because now some are asking that cancer patients who are required to wear masks all day are also being asked to be included in the donation so I want to extend a huge thank you to all of the staff who went into the schools and fired up the 3d printers that were sitting idle while all the students were at home and have been running those printers those 3d printers non-stop for now we're going on almost 72 hours and it has just filled my heart with gratitude to our staff for them stepping up and taking this on in such a selfless manner that's all I have to report on thank you that's a great report and I echo your dear sentiments as well all right well go ahead and move on to action item e - governing board updates and we'll just do the same thing same round-robin I'll go ahead and start I wanted to just say thank you to all of the people who have risen above and beyond the call of duty the people that have spent you know countless hours making sure that everybody gets fed you know everybody that's made sure that all of our students have the technology that they need and have been there to answer questions keep things positive and keep things moving throughout the district I've been very impressed with everybody and your willingness to help out wherever is needed and never asked the question or make the statement that it's not my job I've heard countless times that everybody is really just embraced the opportunity that we have to serve the community and especially with the lunch program and the kitchen staff and the people that are working in countless hours in the cafeteria making sure that not only do the meals go out but as we expand that program that we continue to rise to the occasion and take care of each individual need whether in or outside the district just really wanted to say thank you for all that you do and the countless hours that staff and and you dr.
Washington got the cell and Kelly and Cameron everyone for need support because those were the concern that I was that I received from several people wondering you know about additional food during the spring break for the because you know every parent now with two parents at home you know now children is eating them out of house and home every two days it's trying to go to the grocery store or you know figure out how to feed that and the older the children get the more they eat so you know when he's doing his homework he was in school either had to go get a sandwich so man he's sitting on the computer he's going to get a sandwich he eats and when he finished he gets another sandwich so they're complaining you know I'm going to spend all my money the money that I'm making doing spring break because we can't go anywhere we can't do anything so I you know I just want to thank you for your effort and then we can relay this information to parents and hopefully those that really need it will be able to get out and have a little extra help do on screen point thank you in in the letter we're going to be sending home we're gonna mindful of making some mentioning to that and about some opportunities if there's no more questions there I'll go on to the next three areas I don't know is it ok well I'm looking to the right I don't see any hands going I was like yeah let me get the technology Gina let's talk about the 60,000 computers from the partnership and then also you and let's see you and Gina can talk about the other ones that we ordered what's going on with death for the ability to get devices into the homes you want either Gina or or Courtney consarn either one idea Gina go ahead okay I'll start hi everyone so i yeah i'll talk about parent connectivity and our campaign on trying to stay connected with parents our chromebook distribution and i'll touch on the sixty thousand computers grant a state grant and then our big shipment that's coming and then i'll touch a little bit on google classroom so not just sound like a broken record but just reiterating what Kelly and terrible said that getting parents engaged over the past nine days has been afee and we've been monitoring that engagement by trying to get parents to sign up for the Parent Portal and getting updated email addresses from them so that we have multiple ways to communicate so at the beginning of this process on March 31st we had about ten thousand six hundred email addresses for our families and as of today we have over eleven thousand so that that's a lot of phone calls that have been made over the past eight days you know parents just didn't all of a sudden decide to sign up we have had teachers and principals and support staff and secretaries calling families helping them through the process helping them get in get online and right now we're at ninety two percent of our families have a valid email address in our system so we have started sending our robo calls by email as well so we have three ways to communicate with parents now so we have the website a robo call and email address so that they're sure to receive it one way or another and the same with the Parent Portal The Parent Portal will help families especially the at the cave level or the pre-k five level help their students sign in to their Google classroom and to their email which is something that those kids had never done before until last Monday and we're at 80 84 percent of parents signed on to the Parent Portal again The Parent Portal wasn't open to KFI families until three weeks ago so I think that says a lot about how hard everybody in the district has worked to reach families are they of the report cards going out that way - you may want to mention it now oh yeah sure so at the high school and middle school level report cards for the past couple of years have been online there through the Parent Portal and the student portal but with this new world that we live in each elementary school is running a report card and attaching it and sending it via email to each family so that was why it's so important that we have a valid email address for parents and that process is happening right now and that's again secretaries principals support staff everybody working together to get this done on to Chromebook distribution I just put these numbers together today and I didn't realize that they were so high so I'm really proud and happy of what we've accomplished so since we started distributing Chromebooks which our first distribution was on march 19th we've had 4,000 67 requests for Chromebooks and that has come through request form on each school website that parents had filled out in some cases it was phone calls or emails to principals some principals reached directly out to their families and as of this afternoon we've delivered 3767 Chromebooks to families so far and we have another 133 on tap to be delivered tomorrow so we have reached 93% of the requests have been fulfilled for these families so that that's a really great accomplishment and just to go along with that we have another 3700 50 Chromebooks coming next week my team will be working to get those unpacked in on our network and ready for distribution with a goal of distributing after the spring break and that will be to fill in for families who need multiple devices so our original approach was to have a device in every family so that we know at least there was one way to connect although we knew it wasn't ideal if you have more than two children that's not ideal at all and this additional group of Chromebooks will help us fill in that gap so that's our next big push and we'll start that as soon as spring break is over any questions so far yes yes Gina Gina thanks for the update that sounds like you guys are really working hard and we certainly appreciate it because we know what a big what a big lift that is do you have a sense of how many kids still don't have a device either you know the family didn't make a request for a Chromebook or you know they're just somehow getting lost in that in that circle there do we have a sense of like how many kids are actually you know able to have a device at home and login to Google classroom or whatever they're they're using so I don't have a solid number of kids that are you know maybe don't have a device I I just have if they requested I know the principals are in touch with me every day and they'll be like there this request form wasn't filled out but I know this you know I talked to the family on the phone and I know there are a couple you know there's a handful of families out there who have like I know there's a family out there they have eight children and we didn't have eight devices to give them so you know we gave them three and we said we promise we'll get back to you like we put you out the list and we promise we'll get back to you as soon as we get the rest so in and in some cases in some schools honestly the parents were like we have the devices so our kids already have devices you know we have more a more up-to-date device than what you're going to give us and so we don't want one so that in a couple schools that was the majority of families yeah Gina and we had some that have been said the other day when we had about a hundred for mobile distribution and of that about twenty families when we called that oh I'm okay I have a device so that's just anecdotal but it's of a hundred that that had been on a list to get a distribution when we called they had a device already in their family so I am thinking just you guys know I'm one of the reasons I'm asking is that I know you know with our English language learners in particular you know they may not have family members who are gonna be comfortable enough to contact somebody you know or may not know how to fill out the form or whatever and I just want to make sure you know that segment in particular I think you know that gap in instruction for them would be a real problem so I'm just wondering you know if you may not have this information because I understand you're you're handling like the tech side of it if if we have like a sense of how many people how many students you know actually have a device because we're I know we're aiming for that one-to-one ratio so so I was just gonna mention that that's a hard I mean to do and you the constant pain in the butt kind of robocalls I know and another one we going out and that's one of the questions or asking Kate but what we're learning at least what I'm learning in the team is that we can't handle all that so we're beginning now to push down to the building level where even last week I kept getting emails with principals finding out to teachers who doesn't have a device and then taking it to their homes even though we kind of discouraged it because of social distancing but that seems about what happened information from teachers to principals and then having the equipment so we're just getting this big shipment that was my other worry we'll start parceling them out and then I think as Kara mentioned looking at auditing what's going on online we ought to have a sense of the participation rate we're talking about the attendance rate which is very high and I think that's one way to try to get their cake you know through through the teacher telling the principal are telling us so we can get computers out there so but I'll let you go ahead Gino I'm sorry just a few more points on that so the forms were in three three languages and our ESL staff and some of the volunteers are bilingual and they they were actually reaching directly out to the family and anticipation that they might not be able to fill out a form or have the capacity to do that in some cases with the emails and such you know we'd use the students email address and things like that so I do you know that that's happening as well so on technology you have those I don't know 3400 there at Harvard coming down we'll be checking them in then we had the other thousand that was it a thousand that we received from Kelly yeah correct and those were disbursed primarily at least have met disappointment back to special ed students anything else you want to comment on the technology piece so I'll just touch a little bit on Google classroom I I don't have a lot of data on that so Google classroom does have its limits I know it doesn't seem like Google would have limits but I don't think they anticipated that Google classroom was going to be used quite to the level that it's being used now across the world so when you go to run reports in Google classroom they're about a week behind so the most up-to-date information I was from April 4th and the reports are not as clear as you know 7000 students are online it's more about activity and and those are the things that Google cares about so you know honestly I'm still looking for some good apps to give those indications I can tell you that in the reports I can run I'm disappearing that you can see a massive increase in the types of files that are added so the types of files that students add for example I'm looking at March 28th and on that day there were roughly 2000 google docs in our domain so stored in our domain on April 3rd there were 12,000 200 and that's just student activity that's not that doesn't count the teachers and what they've they've put into their classrooms so for right now I'm used those things as data points but when I when I can real it cars it out and get it down to a student I'll be happy to let you know that I don't know if there's any questions I can't see any questions ok executive orders there's been a ton of them as you guys know and you go on the state website name they've got them all listed there I keep referring to them but one just came in today just mentioned that one on facilities before the big question has been through the governor and I know I'll put this from the partner are we coming back well that's still in the park you know I may hear something by the end of the week the commissioners talking against tomorrow but the other flip side of this coin grading and particularly 9 to 12 it's been a big big issue with colleges universities particular our seniors and GPAs and scholarships so just today we had some guiding practices that came out and this is something apparently the K the Commission with post-secondary at have come to some agreements on acceptance of some standards and no standards are based on a pass/fail system that they're asking us all to look at I know we'll be talking about it tomorrow with all the superintendent's and our weekly call we just received it the Commission at 11:00 tomorrow will be talking to us and then we have a meeting next Tuesday intra district basically your policy as a board it's very simple about a maintaining a fair grading policy but we have the full john jenner of grades part of your grading system does have a pass/fail to utilize the system that the Commissioner is advocating would be consistent and as I mentioned it's been accepted by organ universities they're looking at not harming students and looking at first semester grades to March for GPAs and then calculating these baths fails into their GPAs and into class ranks so that's coming I just want to let you know that that's been a big thing when I got that today it's kind of telling us something for killing about what might be happening about the rest of the year right so we you know we just can seriously look at this but if it if this does happen it's it'll be its standard base but it is also one that they're hoping 169 towns utilize now that's just for Connecticut ecologist there's not I would did it out of state colleges they were very specific about that so we'll be talking about that the other thing on executive order right now are even though we announced it at the beginning in the air our graduation is the 12th that is your last day of school this year and the Commissioner because of the executive order 7c dealt with graduation and very explicitly telling us that okay if you're gonna have grit they would like us to have what they call ceremonies but following the governor's Lamont's declaration about social distancing they want you know looking at that postponement virtual congregations and so talking to Dan to try to come up with something you know some kind of a platform where they can be a recognition of the youngsters that can be developed orator and speaking so they're working on something so be prepared we can figure out to get the caps and gowns up everybody you know things like that because you know young Chefs there are many kids they're about 650 so Dan's response so Dan's question Dan's living to finish Dan's working on some and I just want to announce though it's in the in the minutes it's June 12 good I'm sorry I'm sorry your question and graduation is there any reason why we couldn't postpone that even into the summer just because it would probably mean a lot to those seniors graduating before me I'd rather walk in August and not walk at all I I don't know that something that was on the conversation but not a recommendation at this point that I know okay that's one of the one of the opportunities okay thanks but I will ask tomorrow because we're all talking about the same thing about what people are doing thank you are we asking students for any of their input what they the kids would come tonight I think Kara Kara invited them but I'll pass that along to Deanna just just got this and Dan's has been brainstorming you know if it was up to Dan I think he'd bring somehow get him handed to him you know do that whole thing that you know they get that recognition I told her you don't we haven't made our next meeting the students okay very good thank you but all I'm attracted in okay house think they're the districts but it is June 12 we are going to have something so you know at least you'd be in air-conditioning ok ok the next big thing we all have to deal with I sent you an email that today and I'll let Kim you there won't talk about the recruitment and hiring and the open positions yep before I do that let me just update you pretty quickly on what's been happening in human resources because even though our human resources are all virtual right now we still have times marching on in my group so right now what's keeping my team busy are things like some unemployment claims we have some coming in not a lot and the unemployment compensation we're getting lots of people with questions about their benefits life insurance policies the scope of their benefits so our insurance benefits folks are fielding those kinds of questions for our employees and also our team is really reaching out to as Erin Daly alluded to earlier today we've got some folks that have already sadly experienced tragedy and so we're trying to provide as much support to those people as we can just connecting with them making sure they're aware of you know what we can do to support them and and really just being there for those folks and that were I would only presume is going to continue to grow so we're trying to stay in touch with folks including folks that might need leaves of absence due to either some kind of illness or kovat related illness and I'm sure many of you have seen that there are some new rules around FMLA time for people who are suffering from kovat related illness so my team is starting to try to really learn a lot about the landscape that's changing so that we can be available to provide support arm till we also have lots of folks that are returning from leaves lots of people that have been out on maternity leaves or other kinds of leaves and so our team has been working with Terra kes maro and her team to make sure that our returners have access to all of the training so that they can embed themselves as quickly as possible to get back up to speed on taking back over their classes so it's people are still coming and going it's just we're not seeing their faces we're seeing them on virtually so we're trying to be as supportive as we can with that in addition we are I guess a little unlike everybody else we're starting to think in my department about next year so that means rolling contracts making sure that all of our staff who are currently in salary grids get rolled to the next year we're looking at any remaining reporting that needs to be done keeping up with certification for our folks so looking to next year and that's my segue into the hiring and and what happens next so I want to deal first you boys to say I said some to the we received a notice from dr.
Kelso spent just providing that service to the community as has been amazing go ahead and move over to mr. Roy your sink mill thank you I echo the same sentiments that mr. Leonard just echoed and dr. Kellis everybody seems to have stepped up we are you know we're not alone other school districts are struggling but they have staff that have come they have just come forward and have been over backwards and community members have bent over backwards it is a a great feeling even though we're in unchartered waters that we're all in it together and it is so refreshing to see everybody helping everybody and so it's just awesome to see and I didn't know that that was that many ear things for the mask dr. Kelso that was that is an awesome awesome thing I just wanted to say that I don't know if anybody saw the news before we started the governing board meeting but Eric Bennett our teacher from shadow Ridge was featured on Arizona family's new segment about his archery and of course that being the teacher at Dysart but also being a Paralympic participant and then him going on to next summer's Paralympics so I have to give a shout-out to mr.
Cronyn after 54 years she will be retiring I just she did announce it to her staff she wanted to announce it one on one but she obviously couldn't do it but she did put that out you know just let the board know that she started at South Street School in for number of years and then became principal in 93 at Mill Ridge and has been there and she has been us just phenomenal asset she's earned the last four or five years the schools of distinction she has been doing a looping program there for years that have just been tremendously beneficial to our kids she'll be missed she'd be saddling this but we she did but that announcement in I just want to make sure all of us they were able to reckon is that the mirrors been to be a tremendous loss to the district and we wish you well go ahead Kim well my my earbuds are talking to me that they need to be charged hold on these I can get them here okay so turning to the hiring then here's what's gonna happen next for our team is we need to try to navigate the path of filling for administrative openings for next year so we have to at the secondary level one assistant principal at Westside middle school and one assistant principal at Broadview both of those are currently held by interim candidates both of whom are internal candidates for the position and then we have two elementary spots the one for dr.
Bennett and for everything he's done but I would just say keep up the great work everyone it may be frustrating at times but we're we're gonna do exceptionally well that's it thank you let's go to mr. Prichard exam I I echo everything everyone's pretty much already said it's just just in reflecting on how things have unfolded they just really exemplified who we all are as a Dicer community and you know while there yeah there's been some hiccups as we transition into this new normal the outpouring though of efforts from all of our staff teachers administrators finding ways to be innovative with how we still meet the needs of our students and to our parents who are having to juggle their their working roles with their family roles and then now you know kind of a role as a teacher to help their students something that is not an easy task for many who are juggling again the responsibilities of work and everything family but then also our students just for being so adaptable and patient and just mean you're still being committed to kind of as dr.
Cronin's retirement at Miller rich primary and then a second one at King Street primary you'll remember that we have an interim there as well thank you to my trusty assistant with my new headphones hold on one second all right can you still hear me yes okay so here's the the question now as many of you who have been involved in the hiring process with me over the years realize and appreciate that whenever we hire anyone at the principal or assistant principal level at this point they go through a two panel system at just a number of boxes on my screen and and my team is working out how would we even make a 2 panel system work logistically and also how would we provide timeout for the vast number of people that participate in those interviews out of their regular work day so we don't have a sub pool anymore we don't have people at the ready to step in to substitute for teachers so what I'd like to get some consensus on from you while tonight is whether you would be amenable to in recognition of the crisis and kind of the the adjustments we all need to make whether we might do a single panel that includes elements of both so you would still have a board member you would still have teachers you'd still have administrators and we do a single panel system rather than the two separate ones I think for your secondary administrators that are currently serving in the interim roles that's going to be an easier one than for all new folks at the elementary level but I think it will make it easier for us to be able to navigate the process because it will be a challenge for us to try to run the two panel system so madam chair if we get some consensus or some discussion on how you all feel about that understanding that you know obviously we're going to preserve your role as participants well you know we don't have too many other choices Rachel sure yeah I'm okay with the single panel as long as we return to the way we've been doing it after this whole yeah I yeah it would definitely be a temporary sort of a hold it in abeyance and lighting yeah definitely you have could we also have more board members if they're able instead of just the one yeah the problem is that I'm looking at the screen so I want to make sure that we don't have so many that we can't see the candidate and the panelists at the same time so I think you know the people we do have available to us in addition to board members of people we do have available to us are that we don't have to sub out are things like PBS staff coaches you know some of the people that don't necessarily have responsibilities for the classroom all day but you I think we'd certainly try to accommodate as many as we could without making it too unwieldy I think it's it's a really challenging position to be in as a candidate again you know we'll have a couple of internals that we know well but for the people that come from outside I think it's a real heavy lift to do this kind of a process if so so Jo has to stand up just so you know I'm sorry Jojo Silva has to stand up just so you know what you say Joao de Silva has his hand up just say you're J I yeah I am we're GLaDOS I have no problem I mean I haven't participated in the process before what under the circumstances any modification we do make sense now to make things easier under the current circumstances one question though are you talking about doing different panels for each of the positions or is it one panel for all of them right so I think what we've done in the past that has worked on when we've had multiple particularly the elementary level we've had multiple elementary schools at the same time we used to run one administrator panel and then two teacher panels one for each school so I think we'd probably look at a hybrid model like that you know we could do more than one session I just prefer not to because it's going to be real hard to get people spelled out and it's important to have the same group for all the candidates so it's kind of a work in progress but I think probably we'd have a blended panel should you make the process right when we're interviewing we're interviewing people for not necessarily a particular position in a particular school but for a particular position for the principal job yeah I guess let me let me explain it this way just to recap how it works so let's say an in a non kovat world we would have Mildred King Street so we would have one administrator panel so kind of and then each school would have a panel of teachers and those candidates if they were interested in both jobs those candidates would move through the teacher centric panel here what we have to do and we'll have to look at numbers and who we can get what we might have to do is do a teacher panel that's made up of teachers from both schools or coaches that touch both schools and administrators that's what I'm thinking again I'm kind of it's kind of a work in progress with with my team to kind of figure out what the the bandwidth is on how much we can support and then just because we think you talking about you I do see though a separate secondary one and then a separate elementary one so there would be at least two different levels for secondary and then elementary and if you're interested in serving normally would you just get your name to Gladys and glass and get them over the Kim thank you very much and then the the last piece of hiring that we're going to start to look at now is teacher hiring believe it or not and so that's one of the things that's gonna be on our horizon some of the places where we typically go like the minority recruiting fair obviously the fair is not happening but the rest is looking at a virtual fair and so there's lots of schools and places that we used to connect with that are now looking at alternative ways to get their kids and their graduates in front of us so we're gonna continue to kind of walk through those systems and see what we can and cannot participate in easily and and we'll see where we are kind of as things unfold I think we made a decision about a week ago that we would give the administrators some time to get their feet under them with the distance learning thing and then after the break we'll start to kind of slowly talk with them about what the best way is to try to look at candidates for their available positions in the fall I know there's a couple I believe the high school did a pilot with a chemistry teacher that we need right away so we'll see how the virtual process works with that it's definitely going to be different but it doesn't necessarily mean that it's not going to be as good or better so what we're looking for the silver lining in those for the board is Kim pointed out they just the background checks and things like that where you we have to come up with different systems so you know it does change it's made a change in so part of that will wait from some more guidance from the state on that on things like fingerprinting which aren't happening right now so we'll wait for some guidance I think it's not it has not been right at the top of the list and I think as we now start to get our feet under us those things will start to rise to the top of the level of larger group decisions probably at the state level and then yep okay I see your hand no no him sorry I need to go back to something else Kim I just want yeah thank you okay does anybody else have any questions about that part and I'll kind of keep you informed as we go along so that you understand and know what's going on in case you have questions or suggestions about you know something else we might do to tweak the process and oh okay I have a question so that Kate answer's no it's okay I'm sorry I just wanted to make sure you knew I have a question that's related stuff we discussed before I apologize but there wasn't a good opportunity and I thought you were kind of wrapping it up so I just apologize didn't want to do up there you need to know that want to participate and when you want to start this so yeah it's me you know right so I think what is realistic is probably towards the end of April is when we'll really get you know we'll get this moving right now we're in the process of closing down the pings doing some screening the middle school ones will go first those will be the easier of the two I think so we'll do the middle school ones first and then we'll follow up with the elementary ones so if I could have names in the next week or so and if you have a preference for one level or the other something like that just you know denote it and we'll do our best to kind of divvy people up and get as many people involved as want to be okay okay and thank you you're welcome I just have one more thing to add is that much like human resources and hiring and rolling over goes on so 2 goes litigation um and so the court system is also trying to figure out how they're going to navigate this prolonged closure and so I had spoken with you previously about the lawsuit that's pending with our transgender students and that continues to go along and there have been phone conferences and there have been conferences with the judge by phone and virtually so we're all trying to navigate this uncertain world similarly the Commission on Human Rights those organizations are all up and running virtually and they're trying to do as much as they can that way so just rest assured as Jo will tell you the legal system continues to plod on and so that's also been going on as well emphasis on plod right right and I think that's all I have for now dr.
callous said where there might be other districts who are doing things a little bit differently as far as the rest of the year our students are still working very hard to to meet our expectations as far as academics and things and it's just really heartwarming to watch and I just want to thank everyone who has made this time as successful as it can be under the circumstances so thank you thank you miss tanner yeah I don't know if I can say anything more than what's already been said but I echo all the sentiments that have been given and all the praise and same like just I am so impressed with everybody who has just done their part and stepped up to work and I know that for a lot of them it's totally new and even some of their families at home I've had to get involved to be able to help support them and just appreciate everybody who just continues to support education being what we can so same thing same echo of shadow thanks miss gunns born I'm gonna echo what everyone else has been saying but you know again just so much effort from everyone from all staff members and and students and parents and just thank you so much for making my life easier as a parent to you know still working through this and having that balance I may have easier kids than some but it's been really relatively smooth so far except for maybe like the first couple days of hiccups with you know systems and that sort of thing but you know just the people in general all around our community are really coming together and they just I'm so appreciative of that thank you so much I appreciate that any other comments alright we'll go ahead and move on to our consent agenda items dr.
Sal you'd mentioned earlier that the attendance online was was pretty high do you have any any specifics on that you know it's it's it's well I could tell you I think I heard this morning 94% but we need to validate that in terms of how it's taken but we're just moving through all of that right now of Cara she is she was been working on a system carry you they're not ones but Cara Kazmir oh I am here so the thing about the attendance attendance has slowly been increasing over the last week or so so that we were happy about that but you know there's still questions about how attendance is taken in general hmm and so what happens in our school is that it defaults to present and so unless unless someone is you know we know for sure someone is marked absent then they they remain present so we're still working through some of that although you know folks have reported very good connectivity at the teacher level and they the attendance looks good right now we have you know we were we're a little worried I think with one or two elementary schools in the beginning and then as they got their systems up and running the attendance shut up and ace I think we're a little concerned about ace attendance with that attendance that sort of falls in line with the attendance in normally no but again that just increased as well this week so you know we're still getting you know trying to verify things that work that we're seeing right now and that's part of the you know just building this building new systems thanks guys yeah I think that's the best we can do but we're we're kind of refining it as best we can and I had one other question and this is related to the the governor's executive orders and we talked about this at the special meeting as far as the the seven-hour order that came down saying that we you know we're have to we're advisor encouraged to continue paying you know folks who are serving in in the school community who maybe are not being utilized right now do you know I had heard from somebody had asked if we are continuing to pay the bus drivers if that is like a decided thing so right now what the governor's order addressed was it and what we talked about the last time we all met that was that there is room for us to have amended conversations with the bus companies about our contract with them the duration of it how much we pay and what the components of it are and so that's the next conversation that needs to happen with us the bus company folks the employees are not our employees so we're not you know we're not involved in any decision-making about what happens with them but the governor's order was pretty clear that the goal was to keep those people employed so we we are on the brink of having the next level of conversation with the bus company about amending that agreement with them okay in terms of like the goal is to make sure that when we that we are spending public funds on services right that we're spending public money on right and that we're what we're doing is we're talking about continuity of services so if we get back this year or next year that they're available to help us and that the goal and it's specific in the guidance and so in the order itself that what we should be looking at are things like labor costs insurance costs and not things like unused fuel that would be cost avoidance items so that's the conversation that needs to go on with sta and then that will answer your question about have they been able to keep those bus drivers employed so that's like an evolving thing as we speak yep okay we are paying we did pay up through March 5th March 13th so up through our closure date and then knowing we have been billed by Ed Advantage which is one of our special ed out of district transportation entities it's a very reasonable bill and so and also they're there working with us to provide the distribution of meals and Chromebooks so so that's one that we've we've forth through the negotiations with sta being our biggest one they haven't negotiated with anybody in the state of Connecticut yet so their corporate office is putting together a proposal that are legal canvas looking at and then looking at as well okay so I don't know if this is appropriate now but it's for dr.
cows do you want to do the two that we moved over first or what order would you like those in J this is Louisa we need to just do the motion to approve the consent agenda items and then go down to information items okay I'll go ahead and make a motion to approve the consent agenda the consent agenda items is presented second this is Tracey motion made by a letter it's not gonna bite Tracey's always think though let's go ahead and vote all right motion passes thank you so now we're going to hit G 1 which is the policy governance work monitoring adopted policy section 10 students section 10 point three five through ten point six eight dr. Kellis Thank You mr. president mr. Crito will introduce this item thank you dr. Callas president Leonard members of the board superintendent Allison cabinets we are looking today at sections ten point three five through ten point six eight this is our normal monitoring process for board governance and there are no changes to these sections thank you thank you alright let's go ahead and move on to G to information on 2019 2020 k12 academic data dr.
Tsao you mentioned that you're going to have a meeting tomorrow with the other superintendents is there something on the agenda that's going to address us opening because eventually we're going to have to open I'm assuming I'm assuming so is there a task force for us to participate in or are is there any talk about forming some kind of task force that would help us to open especially at the high school where people are going to be so involved with with the overcrowding issues that we have at the middle schools at the high schools and I don't know Joe britons should be in on this too because I think it has to do with the facilities and I just don't know if you want to start a task I no if we can do it internally because of course we're going to need all kinds of ideas and help to start us going and you're so involved with the day-to-day and getting that all started and is it appropriate to have another task force Joe did write me today about him do we need a Facilities Committee I don't know what we really talked about at this point we'll make some discussion we'll talk about it in a minute with a referendum the next item but the meeting last week with dr.
Kellis Thank You mr. president members of the board members of cabinet this is an item that has been on a few previous board agendas and we are finally getting to some of the the heart of what we do and I serve and that is our academics and with this dr. Pauline will introduce this item yes thank you doctor kills president winner members of the board and cabinet in the community I played about issues doctor aside director of curriculum and she will present on this item do you mean can you see the screen yes thank you okay perfect sorry about that um it is my honor to present president Leonard dr. Kellison members of the board our data on our data really for a night the 1920 school year shall they started up to you if you click on present I wasn't present and than it wasn't at present I'm so sorry thank you hold on one more minute I apologize this we're using Google meat in another format so this is this is new to me and I thought I was better at it than I am already the first slide you can see is the k3 dibbles reading we use we use the dibbles benchmarks or indicators of grade level measures based on students progression through the early literacy skill continuum dibbles benchmark 2 is a cumulative of all literacy skills taught in a grade level during first semester for those of you who are familiar with dibbles data we usually have three three dibbles however the last one we weren't able to do because of our school our brick and mortar closures on the next slide you will see benchmarks for k2 these are actually given four times a year by this data is used to form tier 2 intervention groups and address areas of deficiency goals accelerate students through the curriculum and shemite data and most of you were very well familiar with we benchmarked three times a year on this slide you'll see data from AZ merit and benchmark three you see our predictions were only three percent off from the benchmark last year and AZ merit would be based on this year you will notice the Sante and freedom are on the opposite side of the screen they would not have received a label this year however after kind of collecting ourselves and medium we decided that all schools will do the same benchmarks next year the data and math is very similar for ka here although the correlation was not as close a percent off we still considered a good predictor between our benchmark 3 which is cumulative and AZ merit based on that you can see we were a little lower this year and we'll talk about some things we have in place Tugg meant that later this chart does show a comparison between data and relation to statewide data overall in ela we approximately four percent above the state average in math and ela however for those of you that know us you know we're not happy being average or even a little bit above and we are going to continue to work to be extraordinary this slide focuses on supports and action steps that we put in place this year we dedicated more time to Monday grade in a team level intervention meetings cabinet reviewing the data stories with the principals reviewing plans for Monday PD and document and having documentation of instructional changes we feel we can go deeper with this next year and we are going to put together a special sixth or eighth grade math cohort which is an area we continue to struggle with to support those teachers and really hitting the standards at the right level and knowing theme at the really deep math involved behind it we will also present data to cabinet more frequently in terms of unit assessments to give to get more data to really make decisions from also principals are engaged in reviewing data from benchmarks and other assessments more you can see also there were additional human supports this year in terms of TLS and data specialists we really do wish we were able to take the merit this year we feel having that TLS support Tier one has given us some really good games it'll probably take a year or two to really see them we know any significant change takes three to five years we're hoping to be the curve on that for high school data the first lied you see has to deal with our middle of the year test it is important it's important to remember from a statistical perspective we really want to be the average we would expect to see as seventy and we continue to trend in this direction and some schools are being really very close to having a 70% or higher average across the board high you'll note that it says ela nine and then it says modified we did create a modify test for our students that have standard accommodations such as a reduced number of problems on the benchmark or reduced number of answers according to their IEP by the in count of students who took those was relatively small we do make sure we modify the middle of the year and the end of year because it impacts the students grade by 10% to refresh your memory we do not modify the benchmarks because they're supposed to be predictive of AZ merit and in that case we don't we don't get to accommodate even in accordance with our IEP s which is a shame we have 12th grade data it wouldn't fit on the other slide in AP data you'll note there's two 12th grade English classes listed we offer a contemporary lit and British lit and we really can't say one was more impactful than the other willow Canyon didn't have contemporary lit it only makes the students elected and then in some classes there were no modified over on the side you'll notice we gave a unique finals to AP Language and AP lit and those scores are present there for math you'll see the data desegregated into three areas regular classes honors classes and modified for honors in ela we didn't decide that because the multiple choice is the same as CSA the differs for honors the scope and sequence different it differs enough that we could create their own unique finals and our middle of the year really isn't where we want it to be and we feel the more work we do building that groundwork from the sixth seventh eighth grade the mortal effect our ninth tenth and eleventh and strengthening some systems at our own high schools this was the first year we gave common science assessments throughout the district the assessment was a combination of written response and multiple choice of interest in many scenarios I kids were better at explaining their thinking in the written response which is indicated with the WR versus a multiple-choice portion which was an MC so we found that really interesting and coming from a beam principal of a science school it's really interesting what kids can do when they explain and they aren't forced to over analyze is an A or B I so is exciting to see that also play out in high school we do have benchmark data on this slide it dates back to 1718 when we first started in administering benchmarks and using them to help shape our instruction you'll note that we've had great gains in ela in algebra 2 compared to the benchmark last year we were down to we think that maybe we have more kids taking eighth grade algebra so we're kind of skimming off the top with those kids going straight to Gio and you would think our geo scores based on that comment would be higher however the benchmark changed this year the benchmark is aligned to our easy merit which is 40% algebra is 60% Gio and why we do believe lots of it's had those algebra skills they didn't refresh them right before the benchmark because they wanted to know who they needed to do intervention with and who they didn't need to do intervention with so we predict that if we were to take a Z M we would see a significant rise from where a benchmark 3 was to that that won't get to play out this year though on the next slide this year a junior benchmarked looks completely different so you have no historical data we knew the target this year had changed once again and was the a CT and it was the first time we heard from many students that they'd ever taken a time test we did time the benchmarks because a CT is timed in a CT for those of you who may not be familiar is really designed for students not to be able to finish unless you didn't that you're in that upper echelon for instance the reading has four passages most kids finish two to three passages so it's teaching the kids a new approaches the test and it really a new subset of skills you can see some schools had really significant gains from benchmark one to benchmark two we're gonna continue to work on that our goal this year was to really help familiarize our teachers with what the a CT is what it's made up of the subsections within each of the four sections next year we do plan to purchase as long as we have budget and a CT prep prep materials which would be used once a weekend that 11th grade math classes and once a week in the ela classes to help our kids do as well as they can because we know this translates into scholarship money for them there is a comparison between high school data and state data ela is very promising we're about six point percentage points higher than the state in ela however a math we aren't we're seven about seven percentage points lower to this end we have assembled an algebra task force it's made up of some of our former administrators who were successful math teachers some of our most successful math teachers in grades three through ten and our goal is really how can we strengthen math literacy and math teaching three through ten so we are getting better results so we're performing above where the state averages are and we also have of a different PD path next year we're hoping for six or eighth grade math teachers so they get to meet more frequently and they're also partnered with a high school teacher so they can see if where does that standard I'm teaching to it talks on this lot on this next slide about the supports they're very consummate to some of the supports outlined at k-8 we're going to continue to roll with what we've been doing in English language arts this year we introduced a district-wide writing process with James Schafer at the beginning of this year it was Invitational it'll be more of a mandatory thing next year we've heard good things and our set presentations I think member so your seat belt was in one today or yesterday where they were mentioning their their whole school is using James Shafer which is going to make them that much stronger when they come to high school and they don't have to learn new terminology we're hoping by getting some unified language and some unified expectations around math that we see this same increase in math finally we have some high schools that are going to be double blocking their math students who come in a little bit lower and I guess they would just end on the fact that he's over the last three years and however we aspire to do better our goal is really to be a premier educational destination in the West Valley and we will continue to use our data to really reflect and plan and adjust and do so I'll stand for questions all right I guess I'll sit since I'm here excellent thank you so much that was a great presentation resident Leonard just to let you know that Jennifer tanner has connectivity issues and apparently it kicked her off of zoom I have forwarded her a call-in number for this meeting so she's still attempting to try to get back on okay let's go ahead and ask mr.
Cordova Cordova was to ask about when we could get some idea of what we're doing this year about opening tomorrow's meeting at nine o'clock is but our area superintendents and would you talk about this we have the same questions Kathy at 11 o'clock we had with the Commissioner and whether or not he's going to let us know what the governor is thinking tomorrow we had the governor was on tonight and he said that he would give us an answer next week okay so next week but that's one side of it we have signed a contract with Grandal we are opening Grandal that's going to be a little bit of a problem with the being closed because the contractors can't go on on the premises we also signed our extension which Sacred Heart so those things have been done and then we'll talk about the referendum but your next question I find it a good question I'm concerned about when we do open there are a lot of things we have to do and Kevin had a we went to a workshop I think was either this morning or yesterday know things that we need to think about if we do open and that's what we're looking we're going to be looking at it's our work whether or not a facilities over and beyond that is I mean a committee I don't know what how that would be helpful at this this right now I'm reading a paper I'm sure all of you are reading it they're talking about next fall about cancelling a football season at the NC double-a level so you know the governor Murphy from Jersey had hinted last night in his interview he was concerned about the fall and I hear Cuomo talking about the tri-state area where they've been doing things in unison between our state Connecticut and New York and Jersey so I'm sensing although I can't tell you for sure that it's we're now we're planning even summer school to be online if that tells you what we're thinking so that's the best I can tell you he is I think we we need to wait and see in terms of we open the other side it's equation what are we going to do with the space I think Kara mentioned the trip to down south that's what we want to still do those things and have that in may impact graduation requirements that's ongoing I think we're just gonna have to wait and see at this point I I just I think we need a decision for up from the governor and then that's going to move us into the grading that we just talked about before of what we're going to do and then then we have some school then we have the fall to think about what are we doing we open I mean if you just think about what currently just said if people over 60 are going to be for hibbons and come back to work you know that could be 30 percent of your teaching staff that's right you throw in a medical conditions could be another 10% and then that could be over half of your bus drivers and half of mine so so I can't teach them I don't know I can feed him I won't ever and I can't get him to school at this point so I'm and you know anybody with a little bit of fortune-telling can tell you I don't it's gonna be a little difficult this year so where do we go next year there's been an opportunity in this miss learning and the questions been asked well if we do things differently how much space that we do need you know can we economize somewhat at the secondary level particularly what classes online I don't I think this is something that we need to learn and look at so at this point there are a lot more questions than answers you just say it dr.
Tsai a few hundred questions so that we can wait for Jenn to get back in anybody want to start a few hundred questions I really just only have one and it was a slide that believe it was slide number two or three and it had to with the supports and actions you were changing right there reviewed plan for Monday P DS what changed what what do you think changed your firm I can so I can answer what changed in other changes we plan on doing so this year we partnered with WestEd we were partnered with West ed probably about five or six years ago and one of the huge benefits was that we saw common language and common expectations for Tier one emerged through the district so Tony developed a common picture for what high quality teaching and learning look like there are four different domains that we're looking at on the West Ed instrument the first is that we're teaching it at depth of knowledge to every day in a definite knowledge three to four to two three times a week but also that we're posting our objectives and that they're very transparent for kids so that kids can go home and really tell you mom here's what I learned in class today and here's how I know I know that I know it on our walk throughs we've started asking kids you know what are you learning and how will your teacher know and if the student answers chapter two that's not um that's not what they're learning that's what they're doing so we spend a lot of time in Monday P DS West have trained the administrators and then the administrators to train their staffs on really aspects of visible making learning visible so kids know what they're learning and expected to learn and how to post objectives that are aligned at the level of the standard required one of the things we learned is we were hitting prerequisites to the standard in some classes but not always that grade level standard so we've really worked on that this year next year a focus of Monday PDS at the site will be to go to the next level of embedding academic discourse which we know what the person doing the talking is lots of times the person doing the learning and on formative assessments oh you're you're teaching and learning specialists were part of this Monday PD with West End yes they designed and delivered the lessons with administration they've conducted walkthroughs many of them are doing it's called in and out coaching so I go into your room I be partnered with my administrator so that I can give you in time feedback and pull you out of the classroom for about five minutes I have a quick conference and you can go back and adjust in action that works really well for some of our teachers some of them prefer to get feedback after their lesson or in the office so we're practically really using West Ed with both our teaching and learning specialists and with our administrators to really create and refine our our progress with creating strong instructional leaders because we know that certain things are just common in every high performing school as safety is always a concern but we also need strong instructional leaders who really talk the talk and walk the walk and and I think you're right dr.
suck can I just add one thing to that is I think if we know we've learned nothing from this whole process is that it's all about the planning it's all about the pandemic planning and you know we have I think as a team really learned particularly early on when Lisa Morrisey pulled us all together and said it's time for you to dust off your plan so I think that one of the things we keep looking at is how do we continue to modify our plans for whatever you situation we might face whether it's you know like I said maybe it's measles one day and maybe it's covert one day and I think that's the piece that you know if we can continue the planning the way we've been doing and make sure that we've built it so that we can plug in the parameters I think we'll be in really much better shape and so that's part of what we're all working toward I think yeah I see this name was like a kaleidoscope all this coming together I think if it comes together could be a good thing and there's some opportunities so I don't know what that a committee like that with the helpful Kathy I just know we need some kind of plan because we are going to open eventually and I think with the new testing that will be coming out we'll be finding out who has who has it who who doesn't and I don't know we just need some some sort of road map to help us open oh I agree with that and I think Fairfield County is probably not going to be able to open as early as may be where I am now in Stonington where we only have 11 cases I think they're going to be hard-pressed to open up a part of the state educationally and not the other part I just from it from a lot of so a lot of just just from the grading system that come for just competition in escalation that's right you know you're gonna have half the state participate the other half not participate it's good ahead you'll really see a war right but the answer because we need to plan about if we open this year that's one of our questions what are we doing and then what do we do this summer and then what do we do this fall the fall and that's the plan in fact you know the the thing that that Kevin attended had a kind of a worksheet for us to work toward so that's something we'll be talking about I mean you know having it all come together you've heard it first here we talked about next year about maybe even looping our kids so they stay with the same teachers I mean which is brainstorming how do we best serve our youngsters and not lose them and I think you're right on target about that so we're just thinking this term that Kathy I think Kathy I think you'll be reassured to know that the training that South was referring to it encouraged our district to look at ways to reconstitute how that how our school community looks when we go back so we talked about doing really exactly what you just said and that's coming up with some type of roadmap for for implementation plan post-incident right so we just had this big Hogan incident anticipating we will be back in the fall and then coming up with a plan a contingency plan on what happens yeah yeah that's why I try to you know come up with and you've heard the term tabletop scenarios and as a district we we we we identify a number of different tabletop scenarios and talk about how to district will respond to any event of and so we have a we have a significant plan in place now for emergencies that we've been encouraged to revisit in addition to coming up with an additional plan specifically for re-entering our schools you know and how we're going to educate them how we're going to free up more space in our respective schools and and you know and try to continue to encourage social distancing and so we have a lot to consider to your point and it's where we're mindful of all of those things in there and the training yesterday was was was eye-opening for all of us good thank you okay okay claryce could I ask a question please yes this goes back to solve something you just answered in terms of Kathy's question um because if and kimmel appreciate this if the courts are any indication of Connecticut's thinking I don't vision any scenario by which we're coming back this year because the courts which are still open are closing more and more things more and more facilities every single day we're but you just said something about summer school so we're ins we're already planning on summer school online if necessary yeah we can't wait we were just kind of so on what that might look like and how we get off for the extension for parents that want extension those that need remediation and support so we're looking at the gamete dish this summer yeah you have the great opportunity so we can get more computers then I write it along back right so we we have a lot of a lot of things that can really can leverage with this look at this as an opportunity so yes in terms of that summer school program is there any way to expand that to voluntary things for kids to do I don't know what where where cost comes in because that don't mean summer school but they may want us something to do or there may be interested in something I'm just wondering what we can offer we looked at we're looking our normal some school my dream has always been to have school where some school where kids come for electives that didn't have to come to some school it hasn't gone anywhere but we're thinking about we have what we call mandatory summer school and today we're talking about that there are youngsters that have some gaps parents would like to see them more engaged and offer it as an elective it has to be a paid summer school you know could it be like summer camp learning but it would and we talked about different venues in fact care one of her questions with Kara Kara went agenda yeah Gary had a question about one of the questions that we put on the survey today was if we did but knowing that we don't know what summer school will look like given our current situation whether it would be a traditional summer school in person or would we try to do this in a distance you know you really have to retool everything that we ever did with summer school the same way that we're doing now so we asked staff if they would be interested in teaching in summer school only if it was a traditional forum or if it was in a distance or didn't matter they would still want to teach and so part of our issue every years making sure that we have enough staff to actually want to teach summer school that's always a big issue so you know we can invite hundreds and hundreds of kids that qualify for summer school and even more for enrichment but if you don't have the staff to the better service right we have to have the appropriate ratio to to move it forward so it really is dependent upon available staff and so we'll see how where folks are with their comfort level with this and maybe by by the you know by late early summer people have gained enough confidence and what they're doing now to continue that through the summer but I think time will be a little bit of a teller on that one but we did I'll know my survey results probably the next day or so good news about summer school - is it that really for us is turnkey it's all our own people we literally just go in and sign them all up to it to work so you know we don't have to go outside we'd never go outside to hire teachers for summer school so for us we can really easily you know pivot and get that done quickly dr.
sy I can't remember which CIP that was yesterday and they were talking about that in and out coaching and everything so I'm glad that it is being used or utilized as part of the Monday P DS not to overwhelm anybody but the fact that it is part of the make up and actually that was that was my only question that I had thank you thank you hey president Leonard Jennifer tanner is actually listening to the meeting via phone so she's able to listen to everything that's going on okay my understanding is she's gonna just text you about correct we are tempting but Jennifer can you hear me at all can you speak through your phone yes I can hear you oh good she's she's there guys so she'll be giving a verbal vote she won't be bori oh actually you still have horns okay vote so you're great well my you know I'm having a hard time just connecting to any kind of internet right now so they helped me off and so yeah I'm having issues here so what about Apple computers but I'm just saying okay so general bit you're just gonna give me a verbal verbal blows bit okay verbal okay thank you thank you all right do we have any questions now that we can let dr.
sells done enough yeah yeah the next big part here you've got to be wondering as I am we tried to get on the town meeting last night I couldn't get on both Courtney did get on so we have here the next part I'm going to talk a little bit about some of the budget issues and there's been some questions about what our savings and there are a lot of things going on and the referendum so Courtney let me just let the board know at this point Kim if I'm correct the course was still evolving I don't think we need an executive session tonight is that true okay because we don't know anything we're still working on okay so go ahead Courtney thanks dr.
as high off the hundred question requirement oh I never let her off okay she she enjoys my questions I'm sure always yes um so I apologize because I had this ready a couple weeks ago and now I've kind of written new notes over it so bear with me a lot of it is just commenting um I just think it's awesome and just kind of want to give a shout out to to kinder through first for their amazing games games benchmark one to benchmark two I think that's awesome um and then I had a question regarding and you kind of answered this already when you're talking about the difference with the the assessments but in regard to the fact in high school high school math 9 and mine in 10th grade that drop in scores for benchmark to I didn't know if maybe you thought there could be any correlation between the fact that it seemed like through k-8 math there was an overall drop in scores so do we feel like maybe that had anything to do with when these students go into ninth grade 10th grade as far as doing some some ketchup or maybe some some extra interventions or things that we can maybe look into or or do you think there's no correlation at all with that I'm you know we've been talking about that we talked about it some on the algebra task force part of it is really having vertical articulation and making sure to each grade level we stay within what we're supposed to do and not do more and really good good at the things that we're supposed to be doing another one is we have had high turnover in our seventh and eighth grade so making sure we that's one of the reasons we wanted to pull the 6th 7th and 8th grade teachers together more next year is so they can really feel supported and plan together because we know the longer a teacher stays in the position the better they get each year you know it takes two years to really understand my content and really get get good at it um I do feel like you know when you look in when you look at certain places we had you know we had growth when you look at the shadows benchmark to last year to this year even though they're the high end they still gained two points Dicer no I know they had a lower growth going in sodid Valley so it's it's really hard to say why why those scores are exactly the way they are we know scores depend on students prior knowledge teacher effectiveness we so we're gonna try and really attack both of those in terms of teacher effectiveness you with the TLS with making sure we're limiting cabinet had a direction to make sure we staffed core subjects for freshmen and sophomores at lower levels so we Hopi hoping that we're hoping that the reduced class size helps they really zero in on those teachers for support a little bit morale health and providing them avenues to connect in professional ways that enhance their professional knowledge okay thank you and then I just wanted to thank dr.
Sal so I'm just gonna work from the state to the federal to the city and I'll try to be brief because I know I know it's late but I just wanted to highlight a few things that I thought the board would would like to know and I'll get to the council meeting in just a minute so Kathy Dempsey the CFO of the state ed department let us know that there's no indication that there'll be any changes to the FY 2021 budget that will evolve that could change but currently that's the way the state is seeing it the balance of our current year state grant funds will continue to be paid through the remainder of the fiscal year so we're not anticipating any reductions in the current year to state grant funding and that's all set your entitlement and calculated grants are not going to be prorated to reflect the shortened or modified school year it's going to be based on our you know previous amount for the entitlement grants with the exception in the case of excess cost you know depend on our actual expenditures finally at the end of the year we'll see a reduced possibly expenditure filing it'll you know we're still getting that information in but for example transportation will be less we may see an adjustment to our grant amount which will be reconciled in April 20-21 payments so that'll be on our radar and the state ed department is working with OPM at the state to extend the timeline for a few for some of our grants so for example for Alliance it the legislative language is in place that means that if we weren't to expend it this year there would be an adjustment so that we would have the opportunity to expend those funds and then in the following fiscal year and also the priorities school district grants so there'll be more guidance on that and I'll be letting you know as it becomes more clear but broadly speaking they're looking at the potential and they're talking about expanding those the ability for those funds so that's good news on the state side on the federal side you're familiar with the federal cares Act it's about 13.8 billion dollars that are going to flow through the state education agent 'ti to the Le A's to us about 90% of the funding will come to the districts it's looking like that'll be an entitlement grant so it's not something that will apply for it'll be something they'll be based on a formula but there'll be further guidance on that as well and there's there's an additional fund called the governor's and now that can be used for all the things that are we've been doing associated with the immersion in response so you know from edges that we made related to technology you know Kara mentioned I Excel and R as kids so the learning platforms that we've purchased you know glove sanitize there's all the thing purchases that we've had to make there's also a governor's emergency case considering using that towards offsets for our food service program because it is a revenue based program we're still paying the staff there but you know we're getting less reimbursement for the food that were distributing so some offsets may come from the state to supplement us they're pretty there guidance will be available on that as it becomes more clear but that's a possibility and likely these federal funds will be able to be expended over FY 20 + FY 2021 so as we go into our planning process as guidance becomes more clear this will help us to you know determine how we're planning for a budget for next year so a pause there and see are there any questions about the state or the federal okay so the city steps on this and I was able I missed the first 20 minutes of the City Council meeting but I was able to get in through a call-in number that I found on the mir social web i don't know one of his social media accounts because the video wasn't working for me either i know i saw a couple of there people that were trying to call in a me and rich but i don't know if you were successful basically the the budget piece that applied to us the there's an executive order that allows effective or 7i that says that do not we don't need to hold votes required by charter and don't need to have the in-person adoption requirements but the municipality still has to draft a budget and publish it and have an opportunity for public comment so the city budget director said that they would be publishing probably the third or fourth week of April we the Board of Ed still have to meet all of our mandated requirements as associated with adopting the budget the only exception is that there's not going to be a formal public comment period they likely will just get emails from the public and it won't be voted on either by City Council the city finance director also mentioned there's revenue shortfall this year possibly about 2.5 million and then he also mentioned about the property tax revenue there's an exposure or risk there potentially but not likely but I'll explain it on the we have the ability to delay property tax payments so by 90 days normally you have a 30 day grace period that grace periods extended to July 1 you don't have to people won't have to pay the penalty so it's essentially like an interest rate loan that's deferring the cash they'll still have to pay a penalty if they pay after July 1 in a normal pre COBIT world that penalty could be up to 18% for the whole year that piece currently with the way the states written it hasn't changed it's still 18% if you file after July 1 it's just deferring when you can pay that could change and if that changes that could be a risk of exposure for us so if the state were to change that and lower the actual percentage penalty of property tax revenue that that individuals pay it could be up to about a twenty five million dollar exposure for the city which would impact their budget we don't think that's likely right now with the scenario as it is now it looks like it's just a cash deferral so we just want to be mindful of that and we'll be watching that see so importantly can I just tell the board I think I just remember that money did pass through that we were going to have a have allocated did not the money pass through like two million yes yeah that's in our budget this I just want the board to hear that okay yeah we received that funding we were receive that 1.27 five million and so and that's a good segue because for this year's budget kind of let's talk about exposure versus offsets and where we are broadly speaking and we're going to have a finance meeting coming up and we can go into more detail but Kasbah and caps which is two of the connecticut professional organizations one for the business officers and one for policy did a study and with forty seven districts reporting it's estimated that a full school closure might result in very minor school savings if any so with all those districts reporting and it's we're seeing that also so our biggest cost is personnel there's we did not lay off for the most part any staff following the executive order you know for continuity the language that they use around the state is like continuing the ecosystem of the school so in community equal for your school like let's start back up again we need to have everybody available so our biggest cost is personnel that's still on our books and distance so the outside additional costing in distance learning so to go to the one-to-one you know we purchased Chromebooks we also purchased additional platforms learning platforms so i excel and raise kids the software you know our school nutrition feeding program is running a deficit because we're not being reimbursed the same from the feds unless those additional grant funds come through but that still uncertain and then the cost of sanitizing the buildings and all the materials we needed to purchase custo a little over time and we have some offsets which are some savings that we had in the budget that offset those costs which are subs coach stipends over time requires in the transportation budget that kate brought up earlier as we negotiate it's going to be not a hundred percent it's it's gonna be something less than a hundred percent so there'll be some savings there we also have lost revenues associated potentially with the excess cost grant potential Medicaid pre-k tuitions and then some building use revenues that are down so as a result net-net we're not seeing a huge amount of savings and so I guess what we would ask is what does that mean for planning that means you know as we get further guidance from the state and feds and as we negotiate that transportation contract we'll have a better picture and that will be made clear to the board as we move along and doctor cells also asked us to start looking at our proposed budget and anticipating when the city comes out with the actual budget of reduction so we're doing some prioritization planning that will help us to look at next year anything on the referendum so the city told us that it's being postponed likely until June 2nd and we'll have more information but it's it's not going to happen on the date that April date that was initially intended 10th where it was supposed to happen they don't have a new day I think it's likely to be June 2nd one of those something sooner rather than later about that I have a question glad yes Courtney I'm just thinking about the money we have this year because obviously we're spending a whole bunch of money dealing with the pandemic we weren't planning on spending the we had some money I think in this year's budget from the school impact fees from the Carbide property the matrix or whatever it's called today um you haven't received that money yet correct so it's it's it's a little bit interesting in that it's in our allocation so we were appropriated the funds but whether or not the revenue comes to the city or to us I don't know how it's supposed to be received okay um but we have the appropriation for it we have we gotten the appropriation that increased our overall budget by about 350 K okay so the city included that we don't care how they fund it okay yeah okay the other question for Courtney yeah I do Gladys I don't have that little finger that shows the raise your hand thank you um Courtney in dr.
callous and and the team actually for implementing it including twelfth grade data especially in regard to ela I know in the past we didn't necessarily measure that as much but I think it's really important for some our students especially those that maybe aren't going right into college or they're choosing a different path you know it's still good that they have the skills needed to invite a particular email and we don't want to follow them even though they're gonna be exiting our system so I and when I need I want to comment on that because I'm actually surprised you know I told you we wanted to be near 70 and most of the classes are near that 70 range I am going to be honest when I say that surprises me because typically the older kids get they do the 10% calculator and figure out what do I need to keep my be all I need is a 40% so I was actually pleasantly surprised that we were we were be very close to being in the range we wanted to be well I think that speaks to the integrity of our students right our students and our teachers just really making sure that they do a great job our senior teachers are so vested in our kids I think we've really seen that with how they're thinking about you know supporting things with graduation and other things that the seniors are you know have the potential to miss out on but you know it goes from from this and runs the gamut with this or that our senior teachers offer our students and how they inspire them to want to do more oh absolutely but in regard to the calculation is what I was referring to that you're right as there you know it might be do you thing to do to figure out okay what do I need to get on my test it sounds like they're tapping into their resources through their teachers and things and doing what they need to do to to still excel regardless of whether or not they're exiting the system or not so definitely a great effort and commitment around the around so um also wanted to thank you for including the study app for just for me that kind of just helps to see where we're at as a district compared to the rest of the state I know that you know we were mainly focused on how we're doing on our own back yard but still like it's a good gauge um I want to make sure to though that I understand it so is it then that other than 9th grade ela we are slightly below the state averages an ela ninth we are four percentage points higher in tenth grade ela where one percentage point off in 11th grade ela where three percent higher mm-hmm for algebra where two percent lower for geometry we were one percent lower and algebra two we were four percent lower so we're definitely close and I'm sure that these other what brings me to my next question these other extra supports that we're doing as far as at the end of your presentation um I like the fact that you mentioned as far as like the math cohort and kind of looking at some other things because you know we've had Monday PDS forever we always review our data we always reach out to artistic specialists so it's just making sure that we continue to be innovative in our approach which which I know we are but finding you know there's we always say how each student learns differently and kind of meeting students where they are just recognizing to that you know our teachers have different teaching methods and maybe you know how we can support them as well as far as hey doing them never options or asking them maybe what extra that we can do as a district or as their administrators to help them meet their goals or get their classes where they like them to be so again as long as one of the strongest examples we've seen at that member Pritchard is at a Dyson High School Amy Harkin meets with her teachers every week I'd to overlay data with the benchmarks and we feel that's a really promising practice and there's something about that principle being in the room to review data with the PLC's it seems to be very powerful and leading in the right direction that's amazing and you know and and that's what it's about too is those relationships as far as in and you know if I'll some things like that are happening at Dysart high school then again as a district I mean we just looking at and sharing I guess our talent across the district so that's working for that principal at Dysart high school then you know why don't we all kind of tap into that if we know it's successful anything we can do to help our our students you know reach their goals our teachers feel successful in their teaching methods whatever it takes just kind of making sure we keep moving in an upward direction and speaking of relationships is my last comment my relationships because we all know it seems like at least in my opinion shadow Ridge High School has always impressed upon me I've just always been impressed with their their whole culture I think just a relationship building and how they come together as as home and look at their elh their writing scores in the 80s that is amazing that that's just I don't know I'm just very impressed I'd like to congratulate that entire team and just thank you for all the hard work that you do not surprised at all but it's very impressive and again if we can any anything we can do and I'm sure we do as teams just kind of help each other and share resources but again even as a district just kind of keeping that communication open is what how we can support best is what we want to do without doubt that's our whole job is to support our teachers the best they can and supporting kids that should be our job as any administrator so thank you for all your work and all of these them all the fat I appreciate you gathering at the foot dad the dad actually came from dr.