good evening dr robert tosie and members of the board of education we were thrown a curveball this year and while distant learning may have tried us i am proud to say that my class rose to the challenge i thank my students for showing up every day with smiles on their faces they inspired me by willingly coming to our daily google meets our time together were fun engaging informative my class learned how to use google slides to create a research project about new jersey which was our social studies curriculum for the fourth marking period we created comic strip stories using a program i found we laughed a little cried a little and had some and had fun challenging each other to dump a bucket of ice on ourselves i am a proud i am proud to be a clifton teacher i am proud of my students and their parents who supported them daily i am proud of the district for providing meals and other resources for our families and staff during the this unprecedented time there will be better days ahead may your bad days leave you with lessons and your good days leave you with memories enjoy your summer cara rose durkin miss durkin's kindergarten class at school one has been staying connected weekly through fun-filled google meets ms durkin misses her class so much and wanted all of her students to know she mailed a flat teacher bitmoji version of herself to her students with a hello letter and a list of activities and and fun they can have together while learning from home the students are having a blast taking flat miss durkin on adventures daily and even completing school work and activities together miss durkin and mrs catalo takala's kindergarten classes at school one also combined google meets to make a magical virtual field trip to disney together since they were unable to attend their annual field trip this year other teachers our principal and school counselors attended our fun-filled virtual trip too it was a blast name is helene chantitello and i'm a fifth grade special education teacher at school 16.
Michael's College Book Award seeks to recognize students who demonstrate a strong commitment to volunteerism and leadership in their communities the book award represents just one way in which Saint Michael's College strives to fulfill its mission to better the human condition by honoring those who lead with the true spirit of volunteerism the book that we are presenting today is entitled first they killed my father a daughter of Cambodia remembers it is written by Leung on a recognized author and also a graduate of st. Michael's College today's recipients may also be considered for a four-year scholarship at st. Michael's we are proud to announce that the recipients of this year's awards for academic achievement with the social conscience or grace Ignazio and tonic Colson for the court University Book Award this year Cornell University will be offering a junior class member a copy of the William Strunk and EB White's Elements of Style in recognition of her academic excellence the recipient will have also demonstrated the Cornell spirit by showing good citizenship innovative thinking and an awareness of cultural diversity this year's recipient is mikandi nella sherry congratulations to all of you thank you mrs.
phoney will give us yeah yeah thank you very much mr. Perry Jeannie obviously I already presented that in Donna ray is retiring this year and you know that's a significant loss to our school system the Early Childhood Center a Darcy school has beyond an incredible reputation even beyond state borders for a real focus on the needs of preschool age students in early childhood education that reputation has been forged over decades starting with Steve August and you know just passed down through generations and it is really one of the crown jewels in the community of Cheshire and so it is with great honor tonight that we appoint somebody to take over that responsibility no pressure is I guess I I just created but we believe that this candidate has all the right capacity to build on that incredible reputation and so I'd like to pass it over to Marlene Solano to just give you a little bit of background on our appointee miss Kim desert thank you Jeff thank you I want to thank all the folks who were a part of this interview committee we certainly had a large group including representation from special education and speech and language ot PT we had some parents mr.
i would like to thank the administration dr robert chozi miss kusalevitz dr kropanek miss zamuda and many more for their support and guidance through these last few months secondly i am proud of my students because they have continued to learn through this virtual setting despite many issues in their personal lives my class has been on a virtual field trip to space with slime and will be meeting pandas from the zoo next week together we have come very far a big thanks to the board for their support stay well and safe i would also like to add that as a special education teacher i have come to rely on my paraprofessionals and have the utmost respect for them this year i had the pleasure of miss wong and doreen wesley in my room and we were able to meet the needs of our 16 students i hope that the cut in the budget i hope that with the cut in the budget these pairs will still have their jobs in the fall they are very important to the education of our students my name is melissa sternberger and i'm a kindergarten teacher at school nine i am so honored to not only call myself a teacher but a clifton teacher i would like to thank all you all very much for the wonderful support encouragement and open communication throughout this time while distant learning has been an adjustment i am proud to share that i am i am proud to share that great learning continues virtually i love seeing smiling faces during our google meetings and have and having engaging conversation playing literacy and math games and simply continuing to connect and support each other we are also sure to read a book together during every meeting during this time we have all we have also had amazing art music gym and spanish sessions lessons thank you again for all you're doing and stay safe mabel fuentes a parent hello to hello to both i hope all is well with you and your families i'm writing to you as a parent whom graduated from fifth grade at school 15 17 years ago it was one of the last graduations i had due to me dropping out of middle school i know with everything that has gone through it's kind of hard to arrange anything but my child and myself would really appreciate it if there was something we can do for the kids even if it's a small outdoor ceremony for each kid to receive a graduation certificate please take in please take into consideration for many years fifth grade moving up ceremonies have been a part of many of our lives as a school 12 mom i would appreciate an effort to to rewarding our fifth graders the way they deserve miss brown uh teacher i just wanted to extend a big thank you to the parents of the preschool children that have welcomed us into their homes and taking time and are taking the time and helping their little ones navigate their devices during live teletherapy sessions to make distant learning possible having the frequent interactions with you parents has been a blessing in disguise as we work together to help your children achieve their goals it has been a challenge at times but seeing your children smile is a big payoff my name is alicia garbeyo and i'm a world language teacher at schools 8 9 and 14.
Griffin so that concludes at least the guest speakers and I will take you to the rest the ceremony looking at my watch I'm seeing it's only 7:30 at this point in time I'm just want to comment a bit on the case as we go through these Norman just to take a lot longer as students come up and are recognized I want to make sure everybody understands that in no way no way diminishes the achievements that you've made and the awards that you're given tonight so we are proud of you this social distance ceremony however does requires to go through it a little bit faster so I'll move on and I'll be your emcee for the rest of the evening let's talk about the Michael's jewelers Citizenship Award each year Michaels jewelers presents an award to a male and female student in their junior year to recognize outstanding citizenship concern for others an exceptional commitment to Brookfield High School in the community Mika's jewelers believes in encouraging young people to pursue higher education and takes pleasure and awarding their accomplishments I'm proud to announce this year's recipients are Kaitlin Preston and Logan white congratulations we'll be gone to the wels College 21st century Leadership Award the wels College Leadership Award recognizes two exemplary students who demonstrate leadership ability and community involvement the honored students should they enroll in wells cow we'll be awarded $10,000 towards their studies this year's recipients are Ian Bella's and Katie your congratulations moving on to the Dartmouth book award Dartmouth College welcomes this opportunity to recognize students who have distinguished themselves as future civic business or professional leaders in our communities this award is designed to encourage intellectual excellence and recognize student achievements this year's recipient is Jessica why congratulations the Connecticut Scholars Program recognizes academically talented high school students in schools across the state and recognition of his outstanding academic achievement the 2020 Connecticut Scholars semi-finalists award is presented to Avery Wow congratulations Avery moving on to the Brandeis book award the Brandeis University Book Award for social action and civic engagement recognizes a students not only achieves academic excellence but also a commitment to bettering our community through social action and volunteerism congratulations go out to Teresa Curtin onto a new award that was created last year the PTO persistence and grit award the persistence of grit award established by the Brookfield high school PTSO presents to two students from each class this award recognizes students with an excellent work ethic determination persistence positive attitude and those who demonstrate a consistent desire to improve academically the recipient of this award will receive will be receiving a $50 Target gift card along with the book by Angela with entitled grip the power of passion and perseverance our ninth grade recipients are dino kappa loopy and Sophia Donna moving on to our 10th grade recipients we have Nick Machuca and Megan is agony and finally our 11th grade awards go to Giselle burr Bo and Kate you sir sir you cursive excuse me now normally what I would do is I get to these last few names is I'd spend some time with students making sure I pronounce them correctly I did not have that opportunity so I do apologize a little bit ahead of time for C issues that I've created with your names I promise I will get them better next year so we created a new award this year this came from the school counseling office but beginning with the class of 2021 all students must complete a minimum of 50 hours of community service to meet our graduation requirement our Brookfield high school students often go above and beyond with their community activism Martin Luther King jr.
Griffo was also a part of the process teachers from darcy it was um donna naughty who we recognized earlier this evening as well so i'm very pleased to introduce you to kim desserts kim is a skilled leader who has a deep understanding of best practices for early childhood education throughout the search process we learned of miss deserts relentless pursuit of what is best for children she possesses a deep understanding of early literacy and responsive classroom practices as well as the Connecticut Early Learning and Development standards perhaps most importantly miss desert conveyed to the search committee the importance of listening to children to teachers to parents and to each other miss desert was described as a tireless advocate for students with special needs and was instrumental in bringing inclusion preschool to her district miss desert currently serves as the principal of Kelly Lane School in Granby she received both her sixth year certificate in ed leadership and Master of Arts degree in reading from Central Connecticut State University her undergraduate degree in Child Study with a minor in special education was earned at the University of st.
as i reflect on these past weeks of distant learning i wanted to share what i've learned and what i know one i've learned that we have the best possible team of principals and supervisors led by mr teigen and the incredible and amazing genina and our new and outstanding superintendent dr robert josie number two that the communication and support they have all provided have simply been the lifeblood of this whole learning experience three that teachers have stepped up in every way possible supporting each other students and families four i know that when the history books are written one fact will shine through about clifton new jersey teachers navigated through the waves of the storm steered by the best captains bringing guidance love and compassion to all those affected by it as this nightmare comes to an end it is my hope for the sake of our schools that we capture this feeling of accomplishment and pride and replicate it when things go back to normal again because we are so much better together i am so grateful to be part of the clifton school community monique duterte the robotics teacher at the high school and chemistry goody good evening members of the board mr teigen and dr robert tosie thank you for continuing to support our faculty staff and students during this unique time in history i would like to take this time to thank my students who participated in the peaceful black lives matter rally this week i was encouraged by seeing them there addressing the issues of inequality and oppression without creating greater problems through rioting or being disrespectful to the police force i am very i am so very proud to be an educator here in clifton thank you to all the parents and and community members of these young people who are continuing to create a safe environment for all of us and dr robert tosie for your words of solidarity that were sent to our community sent out to our community i would also like to thank the dedicated group of cafeteria staff who have been such essential workers during this time they are incredibly hard-working group and i know many families who are grateful for the meals that they have been providing the robotics the robotics program has completed their collaboration with the ppe made in the usa initiative that began in march with 45 other groups of makers teachers and corporate sponsors we were able to fabricate 5000 reusable high-quality face shields and put them into the hands of frontline workers in march and april thank you for your continued support and of our extracurricular extracurricular programs at the high school with a 5.3 million dollar deficit we know that tough decisions are going to be made but we know but know that myself and my other volunteer engineering mentors will continue to inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers through our first robotics team the mechanical mustangs caitlyn priestley a high school teacher i would like to recognize the staff members at clifton high school who have been innovative and empathetic in their communication and teaching of students during distant learning there are many more than i can single singly recognize but to name a few kathleen gordon who holds an afternoon google me in addition to our morning google meetings in order to accommodate more students for jose rivera who has called and emailed numerous parents to translate for our spanish-speaking parents not only of his own students but for teachers for other teacher students as well to the teachers and administrators that are working tirelessly tirelessly to give our seniors the recognition and celebrations they deserve in particular the teachers who volunteered for cap and gown distribution for mike mcconney who is compiling teacher shout out videos to present to the senior class and for megan anderson who wrote personalized letters to 122 seniors that she taught last year when they were juniors congratulating them excuse me on their graduation and wishing them the best of luck in the future crystal morales a parent i have a daughter in fifth grade at school 12 who is a safety patrol who who is on safety patrol and while i'm specifically reaching out regarding an in-person fifth grade moving up ceremony my sentiments would be echoed for 8th grade and 12th grade students as well even though i do not have a child in those grades i initially reached out to our principal and superintendent via email just last week after our governor released a statement that in-person graduation ceremonies could take place after july 6.
said life's most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others the following students today have well exceeded our requirements and we would like to honor them with their blue and gold Community Service Award we'll start with our blue award which goes to students who have earned over 150 hours of community service we'll work backwards at the 11th grade tenth grade and if there's any ninth graders will include those as well you'll see when I read their names next to them is the number of hours that they have approved so far and I will say those out loud in 11th grade Christopher s gone with 150 3.9 hours Austen 11th grade aza Jenner with 168 point one five hours Kaylee Gunn 226 out grace hash Senado 153 hours Kathryn Bay had 196 hours we also have a few more 11th graders we have Christopher karela with 161 0.75 hours Trinity Torres with 196 hours we also have a few students in tenth grade who have earned this award and the first is Bailey Mahoney and I lied it's not another 10th grader we also have a ninth grader and Bailey already had two or 28.5 but we have a ninth grader and that is Aditya Shanker with two hundred ten point five hours so they have all earned the blue community service awards will be going to be gold community service awards which are for students who have earned over 250 hours of community service today we'll start with our 11th graders Benjamin bogus with 280 6.5 hours Mariella ayan Ella with 250 seven point five hours a dash kandula four hundred and thirty nine point zero six hours Arianna Lance bomb two hundred sixty nine point five million two hundred and seventy six hours Matangi nella cherry at two hundred and sixty four point five also have amethyst Van Antwerp at 276 Logan white with 667 and Kathryn Juergen with two hundred fifty five point five hours we have some tenth graders who have also reached this milestone and we have a Lex adapter at four hundred and forty nine hours and Karolina Vitale at three hundred and seventy six so at 7:37 p.m.
Joseph her supervisors her Superintendent of ten years dr. Allen Adly who's now superintendent Mary Ann her superintendent in Granby and as well as her assistant superintendent and I had many conversations over the last couple weeks and not speak more highly of qualifications so I present that information to you all Thank You Welling dr. Sun is there a motion on the table who's making the wish I can make the motion I'm sorry that's why you raise your hand or do you want to make a comment no I was gonna make motion mister yes all right okay I moved that the Cheshire Board of Education appoint Kimberly dessert to the position of Darci school principal effective July 1 2020 further that miss dessert be compensated in accordance with the collective bargaining agreement between the board and the Cheshire administrative personnel discussion Thank You mr. chairman I had the opportunity to sit down and to speak with principal or soon-to-be principal dessert and we had a great conversation and I have all the confidence that Darcy school is being left in great hands so congratulations thank you thank you and you're next hi I miss dessert I just want to say welcome and I'm sure that we will be happy with you we have now had many great hires under dr.
so as long as social distancing guidelines remain in effect to see if our district would be open to accommodating such i'm still waiting a response i'm still awaiting an update the governor's update can be found and there's a url link i was advised about the virtual graduation however while yes i'd agree that something is definitely better than nothing i wholeheartedly believe that the district would would at least attempt to give all of our amazing hard-working students a truly better memory and moment for their graduations because this is a moment that could be never this moment can never be duplicated i am not asking nor expecting the same type of experience or ceremony that would normally come with the moving up ceremonies and or graduations i am just asking as a parent who would gladly donate my time if needed for any sort of setup required to make this happen if a smaller outdoor 20 to 30 minute ceremony with limited parent family attendance is that hard for is is that that hard for a district to accommodate while i understand that the teachers contracts end on june 30th i find it quite hard to fathom that those responsible for for coordinating such ceremonies would think that teachers and their parents wouldn't donate their time to make this moment memory happen for their children have the teachers been pulled to see if they'd be willing to help coordinate and or accommodate such for the summer my daughter has spent the past six years working hard and looking forward to her fifth grade moving up ceremony as well as the safety patrol washington field trip and how sad it is to see her and the others at no fault of their own in layman's terms robbed of not only the experience but the moment and memory that could never be duplicated we are all going through this together and it's during times like these that we are able to truly step up and not only be there for one another but also attempt to truly understand one another and as a clifton resident homeowner and parent that is fully involved with my school and our hsa i i had a higher expectation for a district regarding this matter anne-marie sheridan i want to share some awesome news the wood woodrow wilson middle school raises thousands for st joseph's medical center the wwms 8th grade trip a cruise on spirit cruise lines touring the new york harbor was cancelled due to covet what started as a token of generosity by a few of our families who chose to donate the trip refund to charity a fundraising effort to aid front-line workers in the battle against covet 19 became a huge success together students and teachers raised thousand seven hundred dollars to donate to st joe's hospital and medical center in patterson st joe's is one of the only area hospitals that never turns away a patient who is unable to pay in the last three months sj st joe's medical center has treated over 2 500 coveted cases the money raised is going directly to aid frontline workers and patients by providing essential equipment for the day to day operations of the hospital the saint joe's foundation was thrilled with the news of our donation not just because the money is needed but because our kids took the disappointment of losing the class trip and channeled it into something positive this experience has been another example of the life lessons our students have learned in the face of adversity i'm about halfway through john o'reilly's social studies teacher key club advisor clifton high school i wanted to share how one teacher jacqueline turk a sophomore english teacher and an np club advisor has contributed her organizational skills and talents to the clifton community since the covenant 19 pandemic began jackie realized that many clifton students were not going to have access to normal tutoring resources since the pandemic had taken away possibilities for meetings as a result she created an online tutoring service run by p key clubbers that would that would contact parents and guardians to set up digital tutoring sessions so students can have individual instructions in subjects that they are struggling with since march this tutoring service has helped many students jackie's hard work organizational ability and collaboration with our key club and community has allowed this to be very successful just just thought it was a nice moment worthy to be praised by last year's teacher of the year carla rodwig rodriguez grade 7 inclusion teacher at woodrow i wanted to take this opportunity to thank woodrow wilson middle school community and their and the clifton community at large for supporting the unified champion schools initiative and the woodrow wilson play unified program since remote learning we have been working hard to continue our programs and our mission for creating an inclusive school environment so that our differently abled students and students of all abilities continue to feel like they belong and their voices are heard in april we held our annual week of respect spread the word to end the r word we shared various videos from special olympics play unify teachers and students signed the pledge to end the r word and we held a mustangs our all-in day this week we are hosting a virtual summer game spirit week to support our athletes and unified partners we've had virtual high fives participate participate in the many fun activities from the woodrow wheels virtual field day yesterday we all ran a few miles for global running day today we danced our pants off and tomorrow we be tomorrow we be fans in the stands showing our spirit for virtual special olympics summer games opening ceremonies which can be live streamed on the sonj summer games website thank you for all your continuous support of this wonderful program my name is luciana camanero and i'm a bilingual esl teacher at school 12.
that does officially conclude our program for the evening there's a few people I want to make sure that I thank the first of our students for your continual work and your achievement to be able to recognize that tonight again like I said previously the length of this ceremony does not diminish your accomplishments want to make sure you know that thank you to the families for joining us tonight via YouTube and a live stream and also for supporting new students throughout their high school career so quad additionally the staff who were great to recognize those students who achieve these levels of academic excellence and I appreciate all they've done throughout the course of this year and especially during distance learner I'd want to thank mrs. Colavito and mr. Conklin who both helped me set up this technological masterpiece that you see in front of you in addition to mrs.
Solon's direction and I'm sure that you are going to be the next great confidence in our school system so thank you for coming to us and welcome thank you I appreciate that any other board member awesome please yeah thank you so that's thank you for coming joining us in Cheshire but just have a procedural question for Jeff is this a symbolic motion basically because we you know I have the authority to hire principals actually and so this is we do this to share our new principal appointees with the full community and also ask you know the board to provide their support although miss dessert is not yet signed a contract we don't we don't we have the board appointment and then we sign the contract she hopefully will be able to do that tomorrow okay I just I just want to be clear for the public that this is symbolic and hiring and firing anything is basically it's all that's all belong to the superintendent and the superintendent reports to the board and this is a symbolic vote and I'm happy I can support that thank you thank you thank you welcome miss deserve we're happy to have you come having recommended looking forward to your expertise and helping Darcy school and look forward to working with you so welcome and we we were kind of joking or kind of toying around yesterday a little bit about hey we do we have you wait the entire meaning to the very end to get to the right we can just do that and any kind of good conscience so we Sutton's look a little quicker so that we get knowledge you and bulking a bore so so welcome thank you I appreciate that I'm really excited to be joining Cheshire public schools I really look forward to continue the great work that is happening at Darcy school and really to work with the school community to best educate our youngest learners thank you welcome we have some fun up next we have our quickly important my correct yes thank you that would be you faith sorry okay the my tonight we are moving to approve textbook titled essentials of comparative politics and cases we had a four week review and it seemed to pass muster in the interest of time I the documentation is on it has been sent to you do you want me to go through it or would you just we discussed it at the last meeting do we need to review that I'm just I'm curious what would you like us like me to do well wait that's you if if the board members feel they read the updates and don't have any questions we still haven't spent too much time on that but that chair Kirkland that's your call okay well let me can I have a motion perhaps if you call for the motion and then we can discuss sounds good faith at was shooting directly first and against it but I got it so is there a motion on the curriculum this one what the maybe I can make it I move that the Treasury Board of Education approved the purchase of the following textbook essentials of a comparative politics with cases sixth ap edition and second any discussion seeing there is no no Tim yes yeah just a little bit of background on it it's not just for me it's for the public that's watching happy to go through it I'm sorry this is a review from April you have the title I miss published date of publication was 2018 a description this book is the best option for a text for AP comparative government class which is a new class at the high school this year or starting next year because it has both chapters centered around the thematic threads that are the core of the AP comparative government curriculum as well as having case study chapters the case study chapter addresses the same core themes in the AP sick in the AP 6o in the AP six the UK Russia China Iran Mexico in Nigeria the book is readable for students and they did review it it is very readable and has correlation guide that will help the instructor utilize the book in a way that facilitates a thematic or country-by-country course organization the book is well reviewed by colleagues across the country that teach AP comparative government most people in the teacher community who have adopted adopted it find it more successful in engaging students while meeting the content requirements of the recently revised CED though it is not perfectly aligned with the new CED a text that is aligned is more than a year and a half away according to the publisher when consulting the teacher community most teachers favored this text over others due to how comprehensive it is compared to the next most popular text that is more a study guide than an actual test the text the textbook company also provides an instructor manual test Bank and other classroom resources that other tests text do not the cost of the purchase is it's here somewhere one nine hundred two dollars thank you miss Solano dollars each and we need twenty-five of them yes there's the number so that's the summary of the book and it is that that basically came from Tim Galvin the AP yes it did teacher okay yes okay it was proved by the crit unanimously by the curriculum committee and as I said it was there for review by both public and board members who were interested okay any other questions from our board members seeing as there's not the motion the motion excuse me move that the treasurer board education approved the purchase the following textbook essentials of comparative politics of cases sixth ap edition all those in favor please raise your hands Deanna's motion passes thank you faith Eilis anything else after curriculum we're gonna move on to Finance starting with a financial update what that one I suppose I'll be mr.
i just want to take a minute to thank all our clifton school community for pulling through during these hard times to all the administrators thank you for keeping us informed and supplying us with the educational content we need to continue teaching our students to all the teachers who have gone above and beyond to keep their students engaged and learning thank you to all the parents for doing that what they what they can to ease the children's minds about the scary times that we are now facing thank you and a big thank you to all the students who despite this very difficult and sometimes challenging new way of learning you have not given up on your education i am honored and grateful to be part of our strong clinton community elizabeth prize music teacher at ccms on behalf of the music program at ccms i would like to thank dr robertosi mr teigen ms kuzelevitz and the board of education for their ongoing support of the clifton staff and our arts program the students of ccms have been working together throughout our distance learning to keep playing and practicing their instruments not only has that allowed us as t as their teachers to create virtual performance recordings of our band strings and choral groups but we have also created a virtual talent show that showcases students from throughout our whole school both in music and in art and this includes virtual performances from some of our ensembles for the students the opportunity to still create music and perform keeps them connected and engaged in their distance learning they have learned to use different video and audio technologies to do this and we could not be prouder of them i would also like to recognize my colleagues who have gone above and beyond in writing new technologies as well as able to edit as well as being able to edit these performances and ensure that our music program continues to thrive while distance learning has had its challenges for all of us it has also helped us continue to find new and innovative ways to make sure that our students continue to have music as an outlet to express themselves i am proud to be part of this department and this music program thank you so much for your time um miss allison zicker 6th grade math teacher at cc my name is allison zicker and june 19th will conclude my second year of teaching at ccms this year especially has shown me just how strong the clifton community is i teach sixth grade mathematics but i also have but i have also taken on the challenge as the yearbook advisor i am thankful as a non-tenured teacher that i was given the opportunity to take on a new challenge and learn a new skill set despite several obstacles of being able to put together a great yearbook without having many of our yearly events that would have normally been photographed the clifton students parents and faculty rose to the occasion to help me put together a fantastic yearbook that displays distance learning it was extremely uplifting to see how many students parents and staff reached out to me to provide pictures from their distant learning experiences with their loved ones although we would have all preferred to be together we are happy to have a yearbook that still displays the hard work and connectiveness of our school and community i am proud to say that this is a yearbook that students parents and faculty will be able to look back on years from now and remember these hard times that we all overcame together my name is virginia sheehan mishi and i am a special education teacher at school 11.
Genovese who also helped to set up on the back end and text me right before to make sure that everything was good to go but the biggest thing really does go to mrs. Hopcroft and anybody that who's interacted with her in the school counseling department knows she is the lifeblood of that place she makes this run she set up all this stuff in terms of the PowerPoint presentation you see before you communications with the college's getting things together organize them she is the woman behind the scenes hope that she's watching live right now but a big thank you to mrs. Hopcroft for all the work that she's done and I'll leave you with this to accomplish great things we must not only act but also dream not only plan but also believe so best of luck in the 2020 2021 school year that's all for now signing off have a good evening
chairman we had a an excellent finance meeting last night hopefully those of you are watching in the public I had a chance to us on YouTube yesterday evening it was a remarkably short meeting for finance it was it was only two hours 15 minutes and last night we we had a robust discussion about the the cuts that we are going to have to make or revisions to the budget to meet the our commitment to further reduce our budget by or our request by 900 I believe it's 900 8,000 and change and during our discussion we also asked for a revision or I guess an amendment from mr. solo and mr. Massey Jana and I believe that revision is in your packet this evening I was wondering perhaps mr. Massey Allen mr. solo would like to explain the changes sure I'd be happy to walk through that if you want to I can pull up then you can you pull it up on the screen do you have it ready yeah yeah if you don't mind pulling it up I can walk through it is mr.
i am so grateful for everything the district has been doing in support of us during these difficult times a special thanks to the hard work the supervisors have put in your hard work and communication with us is appreciated despite the challenges we have been we have still been having mean meaningful lessons with our students last week i hosted a bilingual read-aloud of a story marisol mcdonald doesn't match a story that celebrates uniqueness many school 11 and kindergarteners attended our world language teacher read the spanish parts and the rest of the kindergarten team assisted when we called out on children to share a picture and reflect and reflection relevant to the story it was a successful learning it was it was a successful lesson lesson and the students enjoyed it despite the up people in the world our students are still eager to learn and we will continue to look for ways to meet their needs through the school year and beyond my name is gabriella marcassel i am a grade one teacher at school 15.
Massey Anna shares the document with you so it is you know mr. grubo was saying at last night's meeting there was a good conversation about you know how do we move forward is the school system within our means and is we always say that our greatest emphasis is on our staff who are working with kids on a daily basis and of course there has to be a balance that you know we can't spend every penny and have zero professional development or of course we need you know insurance and gasoline and things like that so we what tried to do was it's been always says trade offs how do we add the English position back which I think we all recognize is incredibly very valuable you know treasure high school has the most second most students per teacher and dirt be I went over that and our January presentation so we wanted to add that back how we did it we put 80 thousand dollars back into the teacher line is Adam mentioned last night we did hire in this budget we included three halftime special ed positions is a and I did mention last night that our special ed leadership team was meeting today in that process they identified another I a position that they could reduce which covered twenty five thousand of the eighty that we needed to cover the other items that you see there remain static from last night so mr.
recently our school held at r a z raz kids imagine math tablet challenge two students per class would win a tablet based on books read and minutes logged in a very proud moment i had was when two of my first graders shared that it if they won the tablet they would give it to someone else who really needed it they are seven years old it had me in tears especially with everything going on in the world right now we are truly doing something right in clifton renee trevinonen art teacher at schools 4 9 14 and 15. on behalf of the elementary art staff we wanted to convey how proud we are of our students they have been producing incredible artwork during distance learning regardless of what art materials they have at home students have used their imaginations creating art with objects from nature or things they found around the house their creativity love and passion for our inspire each of us our education can be an invaluable tool for dealing with trauma and utilizing and uniting communities it is our hope that r can continue to serve to help each of our students families and our community as we navigate through these uncertain times we as educators are deeply honored to play an ongoing role in this we sincerely sincerely thank all the parents teachers administrators and the community for their support and participation my name is carl carmella ziegler and i am a teacher at school number 15.
Massey on if you want to scroll down the leadership team also was able to reduce our consultation line by fifteen thousand dollars that again due to the addition of staff the consult line will often be people that you know we hire from outside to do specific evaluations or provide additional support services on short term basis and Tracy and her team was able to reduce that line by $15,000 today if you want to continue to scroll down mr.
although we have all been home i continue to feel very connected with our students and families thanks to everyone's dedication cooperation and ability to grow with technology i would like to extend my most sincere gratitude to each and every board member for supporting our teachers schools students and families every step of the way throughout this crisis and always thank you dr robert chozi for taking the time to listen to our concern giannina gus levitz for your patience with all levels gloria lama for representing us dr batten walker for keeping us connected and a special thank you to mr jim smith for your loyalty and care be safe and well clinton strong good evening members of the board my name is florencia i am a third grade teacher at clifton school 17. through this year though this year had its challenges i am proud to say that all my students and their families have gone above and beyond in all that they do we couldn't have done it without the support you continue to give us every step of the way lastly congratulations to francis carlo for receiving the governor's education educator of the year award and for susan grimslen for receiving the educational service professional of the year award you're both inspiring from school 17.