They just, even if their parents think they've blocked YouTube or whatnot, that is where they're they go, whether they want to share it with their friends or just be in their own world. So, um, the engagement piece is very important. I did not think about the cyber bullying. And I was actually curious when you said you had zero this year. I actually don't know what a typical number is. So I was kind of curious like how successful is that? >> Very high. I'd say >> okay >> on a probably daily basis we were dealing with issues for cyber bullying at least at least once or twice a week if not more. >> Wow. Okay. Yeah. >> And sign. >> So to add to that um we have a program called tip now. Uh, I would say we receive less tips now because majority of the tips that we receive dealt with cyber bullying.
The recommendations, they want classroom breaks with a short walk for fresh air. One tardy should not be a detention. And then a cafeteria is closing too soon. And even with the role of Sorry, the no reason they're being denied lunch. I do want to share that Erica shared Erica shared Garden, principal at Chico Chico High School, she already knew that this was going on, meaning that the lunch line in the Lincoln Center was pretty impacted. So, she worked with Vince and they added an additional line in the commons to help out students. So, that has been resolved. Behavior and safety, what's going well? The wellness center, once again. And then students know how to make an appointment with their counselor. They also, once again, you see more drills. Increase campus security by checking gates to ensure that they are all locked. And they asked for additional campus supervisors.
Um so so I mean we can either go through them one at a time if anybody has any specific questions about any of them. I know you guys haven't had a ton of time to look at them. We can certainly talk about them Monday night too if you'd like. Um, again with policy at at your discretion, um, it's it's it's your guys's policies. Um, so, um, again, you can you can always do two readings of those over two months. You can wave readings and just adopt them. So, >> there was one, >> yeah, >> that we brought back up, I think, after it was 3060. >> Yep. C staff communication to the board. What I recall is that we were going to add in the word in writing. So I think it's the very last sentence on the first page. >> Yeah. Staff may request a should be in writing.
That's what I want. I remember one time a student said to me, "Well, I'm not afraid of you. I don't want you to be afraid of me. I want you to feel comfortable with me. you kind of talk to me and share your issues with me and so we can deal with them. I'd much rather do that and being proactive is way better than being reactive. Uh so that's part of for me it's also um you know I want the students to feel like they can come to me if they have if they have a concern with someone else come and report it. I've had that happen many many times. Um my last school I worked as the assistant principal so I was part of the school safety committee. I was in charge of that. That's still something that I'm very interested in as part of the training.
So, it's four stalks to three and we're going to see if Jaden can uh we're going to see if Jaden can take out the uh take out the next player's stocks or maybe even take out the next player as a whole. That would be really crazy if he could do all that. Yeah. >> Off of just one stock. But hey, I would Hey, crazier things have happened. So, it's definitely in the cards. >> Yeah, >> definitely in the cards, I will say. >> Yeah. >> Mhm. >> All righty. >> So, Mhm. >> that that was the esports drama for tonight. Gripping. I know. >> Oh, man. >> Yep. That was that was certainly dramatic, huh? >> That was >> Yeah. Still trying to recoil after that. Oh boy. >> Oh boy. So, we're going to see who is uh who's up next. >> Yeah, that's awesome.
Uh, social studies it would have been a cut in elective opportunities. Right? We've talked a lot about on this board providing those elective opportunities. Um, the AMS adjustment counselor. Um, this was a conversation that that I've had with Aaron uh recently and and it's not about when we're looking at that 13.2 number one of the positions that that we're um eliminating and reducing is the director of social emotional learning, right? And as you know, we value and our our value statement and our strategic plan talks directly about social emotional learning. So, it would be a fair question to ask me you know, what if if we're taking that off the table, Jim how then are we meeting the strategic objectives that we've set forth in the in the plan? Fair question. If we had eliminated this position after further conversation that would really become challenging for us, especially at the middle school.
Uh whether you're using a manual routing system or a computerized routing system. Uh with regard to routing efficiency, uh your student riders that are scheduled, in other words, your eligible riders versus your actual riders that are actually riding. As you probably know, uh probably close to uh 30 or 40% of your high school students don't ride the bus even though they're eligible to. uh they either carpool or drive or drive. Uh the time available between school starting times is is one of the biggest factors which affects efficiency. Uh that's called your transportation tier time. The time between your bell schedules that you actually have time to do transportation. Oftentimes if you have a short bell schedule or a short tier time, uh you could pick up more students if you had more time, but the time limits the number of students that you could pick up and the length of the routes.
And therefore it's two per seat which is the standard for middle school and high school students. We looked at operational expenditures. We look at the transportation expenditures. We look at the transportation expenditures as a percentage of the district budget. And this is a DESE benchmark that typically they use to determine whether school district is spending more for transportation than they should be could be and often times if there's a question, they'll call us and they'll ask us to go out to the district and investigate. In your case over the past four years, your transportation has increased a modest 5.88%. And that's that's a modest number compared to your district budget which has averaged about a 6.26% increase over the same amount of time. So it's it seems to to fit well. We looked at the uh ed actual transportation expenditures versus your contracted regular transportation expenditures with regard to uh the line item growths at each side.
Yeah. So, >> [laughter] >> um So, I know that there are concerns about it. If as many of you know with the old Beaver Brook space, we did have a mobile camera set up. Basically, I would show up every day and I would set up that camera set up. That still exists, and we have a microphone for that camera. Um I'm sure many of you have listened to the old footage from the old board room, and know that it is not the greatest. It is just a single mic that captures all sound. So, you're competing with whatever other noises may be happening in the room. I mean, with our old with our old board room, it was the constant humming of the air system. So, it it is feasible. The one thing that we do not currently have at all is our own dedicated microphone system, something that is mobile for us to bring to other sites.
>> That's great. >> Um, and I I think that um the the approach of having your ASB learn um even if they're not in favor of it, they can still say this sucks, but guess what guys, like this is what we're seeing. Um, give it a go. and maybe some of the commentary that you guys have from your surveys being able to share will be really impactful and I'm looking forward to seeing those those survey results. Um the Chromebook one I also had a question about I I wonder if it's school specific. I don't know if Pedmont Middle is the last one to go. I don't know if I see kids in their Chromebooks a lot but I do know they like to that's where all their homework and their assignments are and I know they like to when they're doing group projects they come together.
Very interestingly enough, they asked for additional campus supervisors near bathrooms. Artificial intelligence. This is how they're using it. Language translation with friends and family. Uh simplifies lengthy content for uh expedited understanding. So, the students basically are able to take the huge lesson that is that a teacher may provide them. They put in the AI. They ask them to break it down, and it summarizes for them in a way that's um uh geared or um meant for that student. It takes a picture of an object, for example, a bike, and the AI will tell you about it. Students say it is a tool, um and uh helpful steps uh of a problem when they need more understanding. And that was uh that comment was made with regards to math. Here's some recommendations from them. They thought a universal AI district policy would be very helpful because there's lots of differences among teachers on how they use AI within the classroom.
>> Yeah. So I I had a question on that because I was reading that sentence last night or two nights ago. It said staff may request a meeting with the superintendent. Weren't you guys wanting that a meeting with the board though? If they're requesting that meeting, I think it was with you that the board was notified in writing. So if it's an email or whatever that the board has copied that they're requesting that >> a meeting with the superintendent. >> That's the way I understand. >> Okay. So I misunderstood. I thought if they were requesting a meeting with the board. >> So did I. >> I did, too. >> And that's why I I started to put in writing actually the other night to put in draft and then I was like, wait a minute, that says meeting with the superintendent. >> Maybe it's both.
We do vector training at the beginning of every school year. Those are videos that we watch. I enjoy going to the pool safety meetings. I'd like to go to the advanced school safety specialist training. There's my plug. Um, but anytime that we have something like that, I want to go to it. I enjoy those things. I think it's important. It's important to train our staff, make sure that we're all on the same page. We have had some turnover in staff and so those are things that we've discussed and we want to make sure that we're doing them. You know, I'm the new guy. I'm the one that needs to learn how everybody else knows how to do it rather than the other way around. So, it's much easier that way. As a administrative team, we meet every Wednesday. It's an opportunity for us to to discuss educational things, academics, but it's also an opportunity for us to discuss, you know, safety concerns of what are you doing in your building?
>> I can't say I remember who was uh who was picked before actually was the last character they picked before cuz I remember the Kirby the Samus and the Ness. Um I can't say I remember. Oh, it was the Yoshi. Okay. So, they're sending out the Yoshi to come deal with Jaden. >> Okay. >> All right. And this Yoshi is the last character on the opposing team. So, if Jaden wins this, then then we then we win the entire match. >> Wow. >> Yeah. Since it is a best of three format, the first team to win two wins the entire thing. >> Oo. >> Okay. >> Comes down to this. >> Yeah. So, Jaden's going to go over there, go and self-destruct, so to speak, loses two stocks, and he's certainly making a show out of it. He's giving himself ample time to breathe after that.
Whereas the the adjustment counselor at the middle school will be responsible for teaching SEL lessons. We'll be working with the social emotional needs of our students. Um, we'll be having opportunities to work with families. So, I think that's one reason why I felt comfortable adding this one back in from that 2.55 because I know the role that Aaron intends that person to be involved in. And it's a lot of forward-facing time with kids. And that's important. The the conversation that we'll be having with our counseling staff is they're going to be required to be picking up a number of of pieces of the puzzle that Jen Taylor currently manages, right? Especially the K5 the 504 plans, the 504 meetings. Counselors used to do those things. It was taken off their plate a little bit, right? Not in every building, but but some. Our counseling staff, and we met today with the AEA, and they have counselors on that board, and they're like, "Yeah, we know that we're going to have to do that." We know that SEL is important to us as a community and as a district that we are going to have to pick up certain things.
uh your distance traveled, your travel time, your population density, uh highway road infrastructure uh especially in in Western Mass uh given winter conditions uh and in some cases uh mud season uh in the spring. Uh and not least of which is the community expectations for quality of service. Uh everyone wants to watch their child get on and off the bus from from their their window or their door. uh and sometimes there's a there's a real expectation that that can happen as opposed to students walking to to group stops. Uh typically the morning routes determine the number of buses that you need because typically more students ride in the morning than in the afternoon because of after school activities. Uh the other is that when you look at a 71 passenger bus doesn't necessarily mean that you can fit 71 students on that bus. Uh these are 13inch seats.
Uh and you can see that the uh uh your special ed has been reducing slightly. Uh your uh contracted has been up and down. Uh and your pupil transportation, uh which is your contracted, has gone up uh in the last several years uh and seems to be dropping slightly. Uh whereas your contracted uh regular transportation uh is looking to continue to increase slightly. Uh one of the things we found in looking at uh expenditures in particular uh is that the uh district typically uh uh appropriates money from its transportation uh uh reserve account uh to uh uh as needed to to balance your transportation expenditures at the end of the year. Uh we looked at again the uh regular transportation, your route metrics for your uh uh regular transportation. Uh and these are the metrics that we we we pull out. Uh they'll bore you, but uh the uh the bottom line is that right now, uh based on your load capacity, you're using 61.6% of the seats that are available uh on your regular transportation.
We would kind of be relying on whatever the building can provide for us. So, whether that's in a gymnasium setting, if we're in an auditorium, if we're in a cafeteria, it would kind of be on the building principal and their facilities, what they have available for microphones and PA systems and stuff like that. Um me and Mike are currently working on purchasing something for us for those mobile occasions when we need to be out and everything, something that we can keep for the board for when we move about. Yeah, it sounds like that this could be a more regular occurrence, so we feel like it's going to be worth getting a portable system that we can take with take with us. It doesn't cut out. And that'll, you know, there's a number of very low-priced systems out there that'll will perfect for for, you know the needs and the size of the space that we're going to be in so we don't need a big you know party system or anything.
So, is that is the plan there also to put Chromebooks away, but unless they're in the library? >> Um, no pun intended, but we're a little out to lunch on the Chromebook question because the thought would be, okay, let's have a designated space for students to go and open up their Chromebooks. But then we're also encroaching on that teacher's >> if it's our librarian, >> then she is going to have to monitor or Rhonda and I are going to have to swing through and monitor, make sure they're not playing games. So, it's a little bit of a >> unknown for us right now. We're not sure where we're going to land on it. Um, I am going to follow in the footsteps of my colleagues to see what their data shows and that'll help inform our our our decision. >> Okay. And I I do appreciate that we are keeping them on their person.
Some teachers say students will receive an F if they use it. Uh some say, "Hey, you know what? It is a tool." And then you have some other teachers that say, "Hey, listen, when you get a job, you're going to be using it. And uh uh so you have to learn how to use it." So, all that is going on, and so it does create confusion with our students. Thank you.