Farmington Board of Education Meeting - 01/12/26

001[music] Good evening everyone. I'd like to welcome you back maybe for the last time. Happy to be here. I call the Monday January 12th 2026 regular meeting of the department board of education to order at 71. All please stand als for all. Our first item of business this evening is the election board officers to serve a two-year term. This includes the board of education chair and the board vice chair/ secretary. We will begin the election of our board of education chairperson. Floor is now open for nominations in the office of chairperson department education. Superintendent committee. Um, first of all, welcome to Harington. Um, it's pleasure having here as well as um I it is my honor to nominate Andreas to be next year. Andre was reelected to her third November and has been a tireless

002and dedicated public servant board since 2018. In addition to being a high ranking member, she has built quite a distinguished resume. Andrea has served as vice chair and secretary the last four years chairs. She has served on the negotiations committee for all eight years of her uh with the last four as chair leading the board through several personal negotiations most notably our administrator contracts in the hiring special transportation a new transportation provider department she has served on the curricular committee for the last six years before last as chair Andrea has also served as board leazison to the ball for eight years cafeteria advisory committee for four and the green efforts health wellness and superintendent in her school as a complex advisory committees. Most recently, Andrea served as chair of the super an 8mon process which

003led us to the members still on this board who also served on a committee to test just how thoughtful, thorough, and deliberate my process. A testament to my On a more personal level, Andrea and I have spent countless hours together over the last two years since I've met. We have developed a great working relationship and I have tremendous amount of respect for her as a person and you I have witnessed firsthand just how important is to our school district to our community. She truly embodies all of the traits and characteristics that should have. She is smart, steady, collaborative, respectful and care. She is a skilled relationship builder and her institutional knowledge will be an important asset to our student. Most importantly, Andrea is a fierce advocate for our school district and always leads to our

004students as she start. I couldn't imagine a better person to shepher this board into this new era and I encourage my members to support her nomination. Thank you. Andrea has been nominated. Is there a second? >> Can I say Can I say something, too? >> Um I didn't know what James was going to say, so mine echoes a little bit of it, but um I've worked with Andrea for the last two years on the board of ed and found her to be thorough, honest, transparent, and fair. Um, as James mentioned, she recently led our superintendent search, and I think that's where I really got to know Andrea and her leadership skills. We could not have asked for a better leader. Through the entire search process, she thoughtfully listened, was always well organized, and valued the

005opinions of all, regardless of political affiliation. Working with Andrea, it immediately becomes obvious her intentions are pure, and always focused on the children and families of our town. While we may not always be aligned or agreed, I know Andrea will take the time to listen and truly values collaboration. Andrea will be an excellent chair of the board of ed and I have this important nomination. Thank you. Andrea has been nominated to second. >> Any further nominations? Do I have nomination? Do I have motion to close nominations? >> Favor. >> Post. Given the nomination, I will read the motion for the election of board of education chairperson. I already have a first and a second to appoint Andreas Minsky as board education chairperson. All those in favor? >> I opposed extensions. By a by unanimous vote

006by the board of education, I hereby appoint Andreas, chairperson of the department of education. Congratulations. >> [applause] >> I just thank you for both changes Thank you to everybody. I'm really honored by your confidence. >> So, so thank you. I'm truly honored by your confidence and grateful for the trust you've received. Serving on the department board of education for the past eight years has shown me just how meaningful work responsibilities we share to our students, families, staff, community and I accept the goal to chair with a strong I want to take a moment to thank for their constant support. Board service requires meaningful time to this work and the great communications to my two children who are here tonight. Thank you for sharing me with the work of the board and for reminding me every

007day about everything we do as a board is rooted in our mission to support all students and achieve personal and academic excellence engaged learning and citizenship. As chair, my commitment is to foster strong governance, governance, thoughtful, respectful dialogue and decision making that reflects our shared values between students in the center. I look forward to working collaboratively and to continuing strong partnership, one that's built in trust, open communication, and a shared dedication to the public school. I'm grateful for the opportunity to serve in this role and I'm confident that together we'll continue to perform this trip forward in service of every student in our Thank you. [applause] Yes. So this close. >> Okay. For our second One second. >> So our second of business election of vice chair Board of Education. So, do I have vice

008chair? Um, it would be my pleasure to nominate James for vice chair this evening. I want to say a few words to support my nomination. James began his first term on the board two years ago. long uh quickly hit the ground running in particularly by joint negotiation committee which had a task ethic contract right off the bat. Um and the challenging year and couple years but we handled it with um just such grace and hard work, determination was really set to work for all the families and students in um and it was in that work and the regular work of the board of education center um our superintendent that they really demonstrate dedication, focus on the collaborative nature of the work and just ensuring positivity and good work that you bring. contribution been a significant

009support to Andrea as already very conservative of this role and all responsible with this serve us well I'm proud to be proud of saints on this board pleasure that I have I'd like Um it is my privilege to support James position as chair of the board of education. Uh James has demonstrated a deep commitment to this board's work and to our shared responsibility of serving all students in our district. His thoughtful preparation, willingness to ask for important questions and ability to collaborate respectively respectively have strengthened our discussion and decisions. As vice chair, the role requires leadership of a partnership, supporting the chair, helping guide our meetings, and ensuring that our work continues on the best interest of students. He brings the judgment to steady presence that this role is. I'm confident that James will serve

010his support, integrity, and care, and has pleased to support this nomination for West. have any other nominations. Can I uh move to close nominations for vice chair? >> Second. So to appoint James to appoint James to the position of vice chair of board of education. Oh, >> sorry. All those in favor >> I opposed abstension. Motion carries up to the table. [applause] We'll move on to the next item on the agenda. Uh item five, approval of minutes. And I have a motion I move to approve the uh December 8th, 2025 BOE regular meeting minutes as presented. >> Second. >> Uh any discussion? All those in favor? I >> I >> opposed absentions and abstain. All right. So that's eight. Oh, motion carries. Um item six, consideration of superintendence report B, superintendent welcome and entry plan.

011>> Okay. Well, I I hate to follow that act. I mean, they had interaction and coloring. I mean, but I'll do my best. Well, here we are on day six. Uh, and I've had the question over and over again, how are you feeling? Uh and that has been a range of emotions from excitement to head spinning to exhaustion after a day of visiting schools and hearing all about the incredible work uh and learning more about our incredible students, staff uh and schools here in Farmington. I wrote my first communication to families this past Friday uh that I was anxiously awaiting my first day since late October. Uh, and nothing could have prepared me for the warm welcome uh, that I received this past week. The talent and dedication on display in our schools uh, in

012our offices and really everywhere across Farmington is something that's made me feel just really fortunate uh, to be a part of this organization. My family has a little tradition at dinner where we share a a rose, a thorn, and a bud as we eat dinner. And these days we eat dinner together less often with sports and all of their teenage activities. But uh I said in my communication to staff on Friday that uh my rose every day was the same, which was my decision to come to Farmington and be a part of this district. Uh my thorn was that there just simply hasn't been enough time in the day uh to get to meet everyone. Uh, and even though I've been spending, and I'll talk a little bit about this, an extended period of time

013in each school, enough time to really get to know everyone, but I know that will come. Uh, and my bud has been just thinking about the amazing things that we'll do together, uh, as a school district. Uh, I'm honored to have the opportunity to serve as superintendent in a district so devoted to educating the whole child and cultivating tomorrow's leaders, young people prepared not only for success um, but to make a positive difference in their communities. The purpose of a superintendent entry plan is um to outline the intentional steps that a superintendent will take um during their first months. Uh for me, I wanted my plan not just to be about what I would do in the opening months, but also to really serve as a roadmap for the work that I'll continue to do

014uh in the months and years ahead. And that includes listening and learning and leading alongside you as a board of education, our staff and students who are here uh this evening, families, and also the broader members of the community. Through this process, I aim to build on Farmington's proud traditions while deepening our shared commitment to preparing every student to be an empowered global citizen. Assuming the role of superintendent is complex uh as I began to think about this transition, however, I wanted a process that did not begin and end with an entry plan. The inquiry process that you see on the slide uh above uh is designed to fit right into the work already underway. What you see here highlights a routine for learning more about our rituals, reviewing practices, and understanding each individual's role

015and responsibility. Assessing our strengths and where opportunities exist. and finally focusing our efforts on the work making the biggest impact and giving us the biggest return on our investment all geared towards our student success. I did not want to plan to include goals because I believe goals need to be developed in collaboration with our teachers and our school leaders. Um but I wanted to land on some themes that would really be the guide for this work. So you see here my priority list. Uh and as I defined it, a goal is a destination. It's a specific target that you want to hit by a certain time. You can cross it off a list. A theme is a lens. It's a broad category that groups similar ideas or activities together. You don't finish a theme. It's

016how you do the work. This the the themes I selected here are about the students, staff, families, and the community of Farmington. These themes represent how I plan to work in partnership with each group. My priority list includes strong connections, authentic interactions, keeping an eye on the prize, which is all about student success, and leading us forward through new fa new phases of achievement and success. Our students and staff come to us with unique talents, backgrounds, and skills. My work will focus on ensuring we have the right systems, policies, and practices in place to protect time for teaching and learning at all levels. The next four slides really highlight those themes. Uh up first, theme one is all about opening doors and opening dialogue with all stakeholders. It's one thing to know who the superintendent

017is. It's another thing to know the superintendent. This is why these initial meetings are so critical. I want every member of our community to feel prioritized and their stories to feel important. You see here action steps that include meeting with individuals from all levels both inside and outside the district. And I won't read every single action step, but you can see it's a combination of meeting with staff, school leaders, district leaders, community leaders, uh, to really establish a presence here in Farmington. Theme two uh, has a big idea which I spoke about right a little bit already, which is it's not what you do, but how you do it. A big part of this theme is how I will spend time in schools during my first month. I have a school visit scheduled for every

018day this month and I opted for longer school visits. Uh sometimes you'll see in an entry plan where a superintendent will try to be in every school in the first couple of days. Uh and my feeling was that while that would certainly cross it off the list, it wouldn't allow for the opportunity to have authentic connections with students and staff. Uh today, for example, I spent about 2 hours at West District School uh with Matt and Dan. They ac No, Sam and Dan accompanied me. Uh, and we walked around not only looking through the lens of facilities. Uh, but when our time was up from the buildings and grounds perspective, I spent some time walking around and visiting classrooms. Um, it I really appreciate uh how much time everyone's taking to catch me up to

019speed, introduce themselves, and make me feel right at home here in Farmington. So far, this has been very successful. Uh, and I I plan to continue this throughout the month of January. The goal is to form relationships and authentic time. Transition theme number three. Uh, so as you know, I'm getting started here. As I said, this is day six, right in the midst of it. Uh, and coming in near midyear creates some challenges for a new superintendent. Uh, we only have about a 100 days of school remaining. Uh the staff here is not used to this, but I kind of have a countdown, but not from a like, yay, it's summer countdown, but more from a like, we've already we've already 18 days already gone. That's 10% of the school year. We've got 90% of

020the school year left. Um but the idea here is we need to keep our foot on the gas. There's a lot of important work underway, and I want to make sure that um it's not about the superintendent, it's about the students. Uh, and so my job is to try to keep our staff and ourselves focused on that work. Uh, each action found here was selected to keep us focused and to send the message that that's the most important thing we do here as Farmington Public School employees. And the last theme, theme four, um, is all about doubling down on the excellence, uh, and the achievement and the innovation that Farmington is so well known for. There's so many reasons to celebrate and be proud to be a part of the Farmington public schools. The tradition

021of excellence can be found in every classroom, hallway, playing field, gym. Uh an organization that is constantly and thoughtfully improving though also looks for the next phase of innovation. I spoke uh during my interview and also uh to some members of the staff already saying you probably have in your pocket the iPhone 16, maybe even the 17 or 15, but you probably don't have the iPhone 1. I'm hoping nobody picks uh the original iPhone out of their pocket at this moment. Um and the reason is the iPhone is a great invention, but we keep phasing in new and better versions of it. We're not throwing out the idea of the iPhone. We just keep improving upon it. And so that really to me captures the essence of this theme which is we have amazing things

022happening here in Farmington and how do we keep phasing in that ne that next level of innovation to help us reach the goals of our VOGC. So in conclusion I want to thank you again for your support and your trust in selecting me as superintendent. Uh I said in my family uh letter on Friday also for trusting me with the care of your children. I see that as an enormous an enormous responsibility and I'm completely humbled by it. Know that this plan though is just in its infancy and will continue to evolve. In fact, we have a leadership DLC meeting later this week on Thursday. Uh, and I plan to sit with our school leaders, review this plan, and get their input um, just as I did with the board uh, initially during the interview

023process to hear additional ideas of how I can make my transition to Farmington successful. There's a great deal again to be proud of. Amazing students as we saw this evening who are brave enough to come up and speak in front of the board of education. Uh, dedicated and passionate staff. uh dedicated and passionate board members and caring families, all of whom are at the heart of this incredible district. These partnerships will serve as the foundation for Farmington's continued success as Connecticut's premier school district. Thank you. >> Thank you, Jess. Any uh comments or questions for the superintendent from the board? >> Okay. Well, thank you. We're definitely excited to be working with you and um you know to build on uh a partnership that's you know already begun over the past couple weeks. Um but

024I'm excited for the future of Farmington with you >> as the lead. >> I'm excited to be here. So next item uh item C preliminary 2026 2027 technology budget presentation. >> So the next two items uh in the superintendent's report this evening are for preliminary presentations of the technology budget and the major projects budget. In addition to tonight's presentation, uh there are also links uh to the videos put together by our director of finance and operation, Mr. Ross. Uh and I understand this is somewhat of a tradition now to provide these videos uh for us. Uh these links uh can also be accessed by members of the community. Uh so we hope you've had a chance to preview them. Uh we do these presentations in parts because uh they're large drivers in our budget and

025there can be they can be a lot to digest um and they hopefully prepare you to ask good questions and think deeply about the work during our full day budget meeting that will occur later this month. Uh Mr. Ross is here to get us started uh with the presentation of the preliminary 2026 2027 technology budget. Um, we're getting the worked out. There's a chance I'm turn. Try that. There we go. It's because we're sitting in front of the speakers tonight. So, um, well, thank you. Um and uh as the superintendent kind of teed everything up. I was going to explain a little bit about it as well. So thank you. Uh this uh I come to the board uh this time of year to give the preliminary before we get to the actual budget workshop

026to help answer questions as uh in advance um to help cut down on some of the time during the budget workshop as well. Um the uh presentation is centered around the district level technology and so we have a um I've worked out a way of managing technology requests throughout the district based on where the requests are coming from. What you see before you uh in this presentation as well as what we'll talk about tonight are things that are funded in district level uh technology budget accounts. Each school also does have uh a technology account and those are for items mostly for software that are specific to the school itself or in some cases split between. So if it's a product that's used at the high school and the middle school that shows up at the

027school line level when we get to the workshop the budget is presented in object format. You'll see that difference. The numbers uh that I present you tonight are that district level. those objects as being presented during the budget workshop you'll see are probably going to be a little bit higher because at that point it also includes school level requests. The two biggest drivers of this year's technology requests are our annual software increases. Um we continue to see annual increases in the 5 to 8% range most on our critical operating uh software. So, our budget system, uh, P school, um, those would be the two biggest at this point. Um, we can I continue to work with vendors to try to mitigate those increases as best we can, but it a lot of it's market driven

028at this point. Uh, the second biggest driver is the cost of Chromebooks. Um we entered into uh well we had planned to start the uh prior to co moving from a classroombased uh technology uh program to a true 1:1 co accelerated that uh we've stuck with it with the exception of grades K1 and two we have pulled back to the classroom uh cart model um it's helped mitigate some repair costs but really what where we what we're seeing now is that the cost of the device itself has gone up about 23% driven by the market the uh chip market. Um we don't currently have any worries about sourcing devices. Um but that there too I've shifted our purchasing schedule. We le leveraging ESR money a few years back so that we're buying our Chromebooks in

029the spring uh with current fiscal year dollars to ensure that we have devices available and ready for students for the start of the following school year. Um, and the only other major or I wouldn't say major, the only other larger change that I would want to call out is in objects 650 and 617 um, which are computer licenses and protection and network monitoring and backup. I did a little bit of realignment this year um, in those two accounts aligning the software that we were purchasing funding in those accounts to the more to the description. So there was a product that we were using for some network security. It moved from one account to the other. And so you'll see the dollar change between last year and this year is a is equivalent. One account went

030up, one account went down. And it was a it was a realignment of of those products. Any questions? How much do Chromebooks cost now? >> Roughly roughly 275. >> Okay. >> 275 for the device. You pay about $19 for the case and then there's a management license that goes along with the Chromebook that Google sells. That's what allows us to do all the cool things. Pushing apps out, managing the devices, track devices. That's enough in the last couple years. is currently $32 per device. >> Okay. And you were placing grades three five and nine. >> Uh no. So right now three, nine, and then the third batch is split between kindergarten and >> Okay. Okay. Basically replacing kindergarten. Okay, >> so we still have still a three point roll kind of refresh shifted in. What

031we found is the devices we're getting today last a little bit longer. They're a little more powerful. So a student who receives it in third grade, it has the capabilities that it needs until the student reaches 8th grade. And we typically refresh the eighth grade devices prior to standardized testing. It's usually that March time frame. so that they get they've got a brand new device for testing and they've got a device that can't get into high school. >> I think I know the answer to this, but I I do get this question from high school parents. Um because a lot of kids use their own device. Um but we still have a Chromebook. Um h has there been any thought about how to >> so supporting personal devices in a high school environment comes with

032a lot of overhead in terms of the finance support aspect. There's also the fact that any standardized testing in a lot of cases assesses in the classroom utilize the technology that push whether it's secure browser or whether it's access [sighs] to certain type of technology. So we stuck especially in the high school stuck with district issued devices and we continue to try to push that students that they use their district issued device for their schooling. um when we get into the personal personal devices the environment there's a whole host of variables that we sometimes control to to maintain that access >> and then kids um have to use their Chromebooks for certain tests too right >> correct >> questions of it typically what you then need devices that kind of help the savings from the

033fewer, you know, school purchased ones you have, right? And so it's a sliding scale piece on there. >> Erica, so my my question is around the insurance that um I know we get through um goobox to p, you know, to purchase and so forth and can't remember what the what the annual cost is for that. >> $30 per year. And then so are you seeing that families are util are p purchasing that and then um is do you find that it is that you're getting sort of a a return on that meaning that if the mobile gets damaged or keep you know things like that we can utilize the insurance does it cover I guess >> so the insurance covers accidental damage >> um not intentional um and the $30 is um manageable full amount.

034Uh the insurance is not required. Um and we've already many other districts have already found this out too, but uh that there's no real enforcement on our end that we can do. So we uh the staff, the IT staff um we we work with the families. If they purchase the insurance, obviously accidental damage is covered. If they haven't purchased the insurance, we'll let them know, hey, you can buy it now and it's covered. Most of what we see at this point is intentional damage, not not accidental damage. Um, and in those cases too, you know, we we try to work with families in terms of replacement costs. Um, we don't I wouldn't say there's a lot of people that participate in the insurance, but on an annual basis, it covers at least one of our

035parts orders to the tune of 1,200 bucks. So we're we're defaying some costs of parts to repair devices and then reissue devices. >> It's still not allowed. I mean 1,200 is not. >> Yeah. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. Many districts have abandoned the insurance at this point, but um you know we we've kept it in place for those that want to participate if they know that you know I have a child who frequently accidentally damaged his Chromebook. [laughter] >> Any other questions? So Matt, you mentioned in your presentation that the we're kind of coming on the heels of a couple of years of significant reductions through the town budget process and what we ended up with. So would you say it's fair to say that we're still playing catch-up >> in some areas last

036year? >> Yeah. >> Where basically what what I'm seeing right now is is a result of the market increases. we've been able to to sort of build back some of those cuts in the past. >> Thank you. >> Some of it also how what we dive ourselves in terms of things that we've identified. [clears throat] >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> U Matt, I just have a quick question about on the licensing increases. Um I assume that these these contracts are annual. >> Most of them are. Yeah. There we do have some contracts that are multi-year in most cases. We'll enter into a multi-year if it's of an advantage to us lock in a particular yearly rate or lock in of a lower annual increase. Um there's some limitations as to where we can do

037those multi-year increases. And each year we also declare our multi-year agreements. Each year we have to declare those audi looking into big discount but you know kind of knowing it was kind of that new area didn't really want to kind of hey let's do it here pilot it is where we want to go and then from there not what you thought it would be kind of try to focus that more on you know those kind of operator ones that know are kind of know I think right part of our operation Thanks, >> Matt. >> Yeah, thank you. Thank you. Um, I I just have a question. In the data systems object 351 section, you mentioned there was actually a cost mitigation around website services and you mentioned sort of working with a local partner to

038improve upon the design of the website. curious if there's any more commentary you can add to that. >> So, we launched a new website. Was it a year ago? I think it was a year ago. Uh but we we're working with the Walker Group. Um uh we were previously with Final Site. Uh we were spending about $52,000 a year annually uh just for the annual maintenance contract on on the website. We've reduced our annual maintenance significantly working with the Walker Group as well as launching the new design. Um I have monthly meetings with with them. They assist us in some of the implementation of changes and enhancements to the site. We're actually we have a data analytics platform that runs now that shows us heat maps in terms of how people are navigating the site.

039So we can adjust menus and things to make it a little bit easier. So incrementally we continue to make adjustments and improvements and they're a key partner in that process. >> Any other questions? >> I just got one one more on that. That's it for me. Go ahead. >> Um in the um I guess the Chrome you mentioned in the Chromebook section, right? Working with CT colleague to pull orders, right? Is it fair to say? And I'm new, so we just buy in Farmington. We don't pool with other towns, but we're looking to do that. And here's how that might look from your perspective. There's always a conversation. In most cases, uh we are purchasing from a consortium a agreement. So, it's not a direct uh purchase with another school district, but we're all buying

040from something that has been negotiated based on the assumption that most school districts are going to be purchasing off of that contract vehicle. But the conversation happens every year on the tech directors list serve as so who's buying what and where they're buying it from to help to to make that case to the manufacturers. We have a really good a couple of really good partners in this state uh resellers that go to bat for for the school districts every year. Um and you know they're not the partners that we work with here in Farmington are not just about selling the product. They're good about working with us to find the right solutions and a lot of times at in the price points that we can afford, not not the outrageous ones. Any other questions? All

041right. Thank you, Matt. >> Yeah. >> Next item on the agenda is preliminary 2026 2027 major projects presentation. >> So, thanks. So, uh, Sam, Matt, myself will kind of interchange through here for the various projects and such. Um, so for you know, uh, once again, just a reminder, major projects are those that we cover through our operating budget that that we kind of put in and later on we'll talk about the capital projects uh that we go in there. So, uh, usually a little bit smaller in scope, you know, try to be able to get them done uh, uh, completed like in a shorter period of time. So we'll just go through basic on facilities. I'll go quickly uh go under the assumption that many of you saw the presentation that Matt put together with

042that. So um we'll go through and then happy to take the questions uh afterwards. So we're looking to complete uh art room acoustic panels. Uh this is a project that we have started with already uh and continuing that at a cost of 32,000. uh over at Westwoods. Uh once again, continuing some bathroom partitions, just kind of continuing upgrades. Uh that uh picture there in the middle I believe is the high school, but it's kind of a model of similar of of kind of where we're kind of looking to go. Uh and then you breakout space there uh down there. Kind of looking to take uh you know, the walls area and kind of do some uh improvements there. Kind of making those a little bit more dynamic learning center. So possibly some uh whiteboard space,

043some different things to kind of just be able to have students, you know, engage and and kind of do some of that deeper learning. Uh East Farms, once again, you'll see that theme. Uh we've done some cabinets. Uh the third picture, you know, if you're going from left to right there, you're going to see a completed uh kind of cabinet from a classroom that was done. And then there on the bottom right, you're going to see kind of one that we haven't gotten to yet. So you can kind of just see where that material is kind of chipping away and and just you know needs that uh uh kind of refurbishing uh you know in there. And so uh and then courtyard improvements we started doing uh some last year and we'll look to kind

044of continue that and also some classroom ceiling work that that we're looking to to get into for these farms. Over at Noah Wallace uh we have three classroom carpets uh that we're looking to complete. Those were supposed to be uh completed. Oh, sorry. Uh completed, you know, from from from last year when we did a lot of that work kind of setting them up. However, we did find some uh I think some abatement that we want needed to do that we took care of. Um right. And now, but we just didn't have the time. We wanted to make sure we had everything set up. So, we'll look to do that completion uh for here. Sorry, doing my own laptop. Uh over at Union School, you'll see some exterior exterior door replacements, some screen blinds continuation,

045and some classroom and stairwell painting. And over at West District, really focusing on a courtyard project um where, you know, there's some uh some trees in there that are kind of also impacting the pavers. Uh kind of creates some there. And then interestingly enough, somehow some poison ivy has worked its way into that courtyard that we can't seem to find like its, you know, origin um in there. So just kind of doing some cleaning, refurbish, and and getting in there make that once again uh you know, a safe learning space for for everyone uh in that area. And so here's a summary of the major project requests uh that that we have in there. and happy to take uh just note once again high school as being a new school. We're happy to say shouldn't

046really need any uh major projects at this time. Uh so basically being able to kind of divert that to some of the other schools um you know really kind of helping out with the for the total district. So happy to take any questions anybody might have. Angela, >> um, for some of the projects that are labeled as like continued, so they do look familiar to me from last year, is there anywhere that we house what like the total cost of the project is, you know, something like the East Farms courtyard. To be honest, I thought that was like a project last year and then we were going to be finished with it. I didn't know it was like a continual thing. Um, and I stand by my comment last year about the Westwoods bathrooms. I

047think the old ones look fine. I mean, I don't know. I couldn't tell the before and after pictures, but um so like we're doing more partitions there. Is that it then in the Westwood bathroom or then next year like is that 80% of the projects done? Is that 100% of that projects done? I think it would be good to see like are those continuation projects like a percentage complete or just to know or like try to have in our minds if we're going to see this again next year or not? >> No, that's I you know I think that's a great question. Um you know I think there's a couple things there. uh one sometimes you'll see a continuation just because once again the scope of the work. So some some of them you want

048to ideally try to get through for the whole year but you know you find uh something unexpected whether maybe it be an abatement thing or you you know something you know you're digging underneath some roots and all a sudden you find something that you weren't expecting and and so now it sidetracks you or or some various things. So that might kind of delay some things but the other part of it. So that's one aspect of it as far as kind of like uh you know whether it's bathroom partitions or different things there. There is inherently a challenge in the maintaining of all the facilities where you're constantly doing you well what you'll constantly want to stay on a plan where you're constantly refreshing and doing some things because if you if you kind of like

049okay this one's fine this one's fine here then eventually they do need to be done and then you're looking at you know uh you know eight years down the road now it's a $500,000 project because now you're trying to do 40 bathroom partitions across everywhere. So there are some times that you are refreshing and you are doing some renovations of things that might have a couple more years left, but then you're kind of you potentially start creating a bottleneck and you can start creating an an issue where now in a few years and then and you never know when those years come if those end up being um like even more difficult budgetary years, right? And then you you you cut those things and and I think you know Matt alluded to before there was

050a couple years where you know some some uh technology cuts needed to occur and so then you're playing catch-up for a while and then while you're playing catchup you don't have that opportunity to kind of grow and expand. So um you know there there is you know uh so it is I would agree it's a challenge right to how do you keep things moving at kind of a steady rate where you're not creating a bottleneck but that does mean that you look at something you go well it's still got a couple years you know you probably could squeeze out a couple years but it but it creates this backlog. >> Yeah. That's okay if we're doing the west bathroom. It's my opinion on whether they're good or not [laughter] really important. I'm just more saying

051like so are we done with the bathrooms after this year or is there going to be next year we're going to see it because we need to do another 20% of the bathrooms. Um and then like in the east farms you know I know there was a large sum last year to take the tree out. So I'm assuming the trees out but now for the 16,000 what are we doing in the courtyard this year to go type the question? >> Two two things I can answer there. So at Westwoods, where it becomes difficult to tell you a percentage done is that all many of the bathrooms are different sizes and configurations. So they're all at different price um wherever we are. But we can we could say there were um three sets of bathrooms that

052we um are addressing with last year's allocation and this is another three sets of bathrooms um that we're basing this price on. Um, after that, we would likely go to to some of the smaller bathrooms. And I'm also working with head custodian um in and principal to be able to identify the highest priority of the bathrooms that we're looking to do. Um, and and make it an amount where we're able to disperse costs, you know, so every school's seeing except the high school, they're good. But, uh, so every school is seeing some improvements across the district. So, it would be great to be able to say, "Yes, all the bathrooms we're doing this summer at Westwoods, but we're trying to find a manageable amount, identify the highest priority ones, and and yes, we can we

053can put a number um of bathrooms that we put on there, but it might not reflect proportionally the percentage done." Like I think Angela, are you are you suggesting like if we know we're gonna we're planning to do the bathrooms over a three-year period that we would say this is phase one, this is phase two. And I think it's the it's the flexibility to know that at times >> phase one might not get fully completed because of some of the things you mentioned Dan about like things we might uncover, but then at least you know that you may you are going to hear about this again for the next couple years. Yeah. And then once again, there's always an inherent challenge. I mean, you know, last year actually worked out uh fairly well because Westwoods

054had the roof project. So, because of that, we didn't have a lot of the summer school programming that usually goes there. So, that's sometimes where you say, "Okay, let's descend upon Westwoods because it's an empty building." But then there are still some times there though the the roofers still want you out of the building and so you don't have that full, you know, 8 to 10 week window. And so, it's, you know, coordinating with the various contractors about kind of getting in. Um, but just circle back a little bit like the East Farms though, just for an example, just to kind of uh clarify, there are three courtyards in East Farm. So, we were able to accomplish one of them of clearing out. Now, this is another one that we're looking to address and trying

055to go through that piece of it. Um, and and there and when we we do try to look to see, you know, if there is special equipment that, you know, hey, can we get through, you know, in this case, can you get through all three courtyards at one time while you're doing equipment for cost savings and things? Other times there's just not, you know, a benefit and it's just we'd rather just kind of space out the uh so we can be thoughtful about the operating budget and and making sure to we're looking and addressing, you know, all the various schools and prioritizing that list. >> Okay. Thank you. >> You're welcome, >> Erica. Um just to clarify, and I do want to touch on Bob touch on the bathrooms, too. Sorry, we're going to go

056back to that. Sure. But just [laughter] to bathrooms uh just to clarify um the if it doesn't say continue that is new for this. >> Yes. >> Okay. Just wanted to cl Okay. That's that's the question mark I had. And then two other things want to dive into the bathrooms now. Just so let's go to the Westwoods one. Um so the picture on with the green partitions and so forth. Is that an like an actual picture of one of the Westwood bathrooms? >> Just I'm just asking >> on the left. >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> Okay. And Okay. And then the one in the middle is the one that you are envisioning in my >> We're looking Yeah. So our standard in district has become stainless steel petitions. We've done it at Irving Robbins, the

057high school central office. So we're looking to transition at 20 24 years old, the age of the building. Um looking to transition to some new stainless steel positions there. >> Perfect. So, you're actually answering my you're leading me into the the comment that I want to make about bathrooms. I have three boys that have gone through well, my la my youngest one now is at Westwoods and uh but my older two have gone through the elementary school, the the Westwoods urban A and now they're at the high school. I can tell you that all three very different personalities, very different uh height, everything they can I have heard about the Westwood bathrooms feeling that they need more privacy. And so I think you know to some extent whenever we make these kinds of renovations and

058so forth or or considering you know I'm sure you're taking into account you know all of your staff are going through the buildings and so forth. I'm sure you're taking into account maybe feedback from uh the the staff. I would hear from the kids as well, the students themselves as well when it comes to these proposals and maybe in part of your presentations or maybe part of the the you know bringing these forward is you know bringing the voices of some of the students they because I can tell you and not just my Greek voice but other kids that I have heard that um privacy especially as you start it doesn't I don't hear it as much in the elementary schools but when you when you start to get into like that upper elementary and

059then middle school privacy you know, they're they're changing. So certain things just feel a little bit more the need for privacy. And so the one in the middle seems like it would be that ideal to give that feeling of privacy. So um I get it. I understand. And so uh you know I just wanted to comment on that because I have heard I think it's time you know just and and these buildings get used quite a bit by they're old majority of them are used quite a bit. So, and then the last thing I wanted to ask FHS smell. I didn't see it on the list here, but I recall in one of our meetings something about a smell. Did we and that wasn't sure. Did that get resolved because I don't see anything here

060around the you know facility? >> I think it was in one of the updates I wasn't I'm sorry. Okay. Can you >> No, but happy to give an update. Um, so we've done a few different mitigation uh pieces. Right now the the strategy has been taking every uh for lack of better words every hole, every vent, everything and kind of pretty much covered them up. Okay. >> Um and and doing that and then there so since we've done that there there was one uh trap I think that kind of got dried up and they they smelled it for a little bit. Uh but that they they rectified that piece of it. Since then classes are back in that room. They haven't reported any smells and so but the reality is right now we've kind of

061covered up everything. So the goal is uh much like you know the IR students in the deeper learning and the scientific process we're going to start kind of identifying one variable at a time and and you know uh we're enjoying the success right now and so we don't want to do it but uh probably I think I think we're scheduled sometime next week to like lift one of the vent holes right and then give that two weeks and see if we smell anything. And if we do then we at least kind of know you know where to focus our energy on. um and and then you know or and and hopefully you know maybe it has been addressed through various kind of things but so that's kind of that process that that we're working with.

062So the the classes the good news is classes are back you know doing you know hands-on learning and and the deeper learning that we want them to do. uh you know could I say it's 100% no but you know we feel like we got at least a I would say it's under control uh until we can maybe still you know I don't I don't know if we can say yes this was the problem and now we have a solution but we've been able to mitigate it a little better >> so you don't know the source still >> not 100% still still a lot of hypothesis um but you know once again it's a learning environment so we don't want to have to like have to keep being out of the classroom so we could continue

063to to experiment and stuff so we have under control, I would say. And and but we'll slowly kind of work to see what we can do. >> Did you have something? >> Uh Matt, >> yeah, thanks. Uh I just have two. One, uh is sort of a new board member question, so I appreciate everyone's patience with that. I was curious how you sort of developed these estimates, right? Classroom carpets $50,000, the the bathroom partitions 35,000. How do you sort of create those numbers to kind of bring to us uh if that part of the budget and then two just the the Noah Wallace classroom carpets. I think it was three at 50,000. Is that just the carpets or was there also in baitment work as well? >> I can start with Noah Wallace uh if

064you like. So uh last year uh we had five classrooms that we were planning to recarpet and paint. Um so we started that project. Um, and what happened was even though we had tested uh for for any substrate underneath the underneath the carpet, when we removed the carpet and one in two of the classrooms, what we identified was there were multiple types of flooring in a a building built very long ago. We found multiple types of flooring which had not been tested. And as is protocol, you stop, you test. What we found was that there was in fact uh asbestous containing uh flooring and glues that were underneath the carpets uh that we were processing. So we had to put a hold on that. Um and the allocation that we had had to be used

065in order to abate the two classrooms where we had started pulling up the flooring. Um so that was a a one and a half week period where we had to stop and do do that properly. Uh cut us short on time, cut us short on funding. uh as far as finishing all five. So what we did uh discover as well when we started testing on multiple other locations within the other class classrooms based on the patterns we saw on the other side of the hallway is that those three classrooms we have here will meet the equation. So that estimate is based on uh we have one classroom that we had to have an abatement we have three classrooms on the other side. So we've taken that cost and multiplied it by three and we know

066what the square foot cost is of carpet and installation. Um so that's where that figure came from. Um a lot of when you see it continued it's based on um you know we know what it the east farm ceiling cost us the last time we did the east farm ceiling. Um so you multiply it by the number of classrooms that we're trying to do and probably an escalation factor of 5% or something like that from last year. um at where where where we can we'll bring in uh contractors to get an idea of the cost on it before before we present it. But usually it's based on when it's when it's continued is based on past experience. Any other questions? Um I just had uh a comment because and I was looking around and I

067was thinking about it. my my first board meeting eight years ago um I got I think seven seven booked and it was um called the Frier report at that point. Um now it's called the K through8 facilities uh report. Um so do you is that are major projects still following um the recommendations from the K through8 facilities report? So yes, uh in addition to the security report that was created and we look for the recommendations there in addition to um you know ongoing meetings we have with each building uh you know principal and administration. So we kind of you know try to cross reference you know if there's something that's in the you know the fire report, security reports and the principles identifying that kind of makes it a high priority. you know, it's like

068kind of all three areas. And so, you know, you kind of look at uh you know, all those, but yeah, definitely we still use the prior report as as kind of one of things and making sure um it was interesting. I think when we were preparing for the, you know, board orientation, we were collecting from the prior reports and so I was kind of looking back, I was like, "Oh, feel good. We got that one done. We got that, you know, and you kind of work it through." So, yeah. So, we've kind of I' I've kind of created this spreadsheet, too, where I've kind of taken all the recommendations from the prior report, from the security report, from the principal report, and kind of merge them all into one, and then kind of make it

069high priority, low priority, and like where, you know, where that recommendation come from. And then we just kind of keep just trying to, you know, get through them. Uh, you know, the the reality though, it's like whack-a-ole. As soon as you get through four or five of them by the next year, some new ones are are are coming up. And then sometimes you just get the unexpected ones that uh you know you don't uh you don't anticipate. You know I think I think at central office the the what's it the water heater the you know water heater tank um which was not part of the the the overall construction kind of starting to show some some uh cracks leaks kind of things. And so that's going to be something that you know we didn't anticipate

070for but we'll you know we we're look through it and go there. I was going to ask I mean so that that report is or that study was done probably like nine years ago. Um how long is that valid so to speak or or when would be the next time that you need to do that kind of review of facilities? So we we actually we brought um Thrier actually back to review um to review that a couple years ago just to review um you know how much of it have have we crossed off at this point and the answer is really a lot of the lowhanging fruit that was there we've been picking away at very well wealth for the last eight years as we bring any of the larger projects to you that that

071we bring to you such as the HBAC project uh that we're bringing forward those those are some of the larger so a lot of what you're going to see from there is probably going to end up going towards capital and larger projects. >> But to answer your question, we're probably a year or two away from >> okay going back to prior and kind of doing a new one for the next, you know, probably for the next 10 years to kind of help give us that road map for for the next 10 years. >> Is is that prior report available online? >> Uh I believe it's on the website. I >> I think I think it is. I think >> website facilities. Yeah, I believe it's there. I I just bring that up in case new

072board members want to reference it. >> Yeah. So any >> suggest starting with the executive summaries for the life reading [laughter] before you take >> I have all those binders on a bookshelf at home still so >> you know it's easier to look at it online. >> Um all right so any any other questions? >> All right. Thank you. Um, next item on the agenda is the Farmington uh Connecticut State Department of Education's accountability report and profile and performance report. Veronica. >> So there is a report in your packet student 25 year accountability reports about the profile performance report. It's annual report produced. >> Um is that better? >> Um this is an annual report produced by the Connecticut State Board of Education for every district and every public school in the state of Connecticut.

073So even though in your packet you have the board uh the the district one, there's also a school one produced for every school as well which we provide on our website. It's also provided on the Connecticut State Department. They have a site called Edsite. So it's on edite as well. Um and so you can see here I've provided a slide. This report gives a great summary of these kinds of data points. So student data including enrollment demographics educator data um so that's our FTEES what we call our full-time equivalents how many teachers and heroes we have um educator demographics educator attendance and newly this year educator attrition is in here um it also has data about instruction and resources you can see you can see them there I'm reading them to you because these are

074sort of these highlevel indicators um about our district and also I just want to point out that in many ways it lines up to our school development plans our school development plans we have in the uh buckets of climate and culture which really has a lot to do with the student data and educator data right if you're looking for you know we'll have action steps and then results and outcomes related to that and so many of those you'll find here um instruction resources really lines up to teaching and learning and performance and accountability really lines up to student achievement so in many ways this is It's really a great counterpart uh public counterpart um to our own internal reports like the school development plan. Um I'm not going to actually go over a lot of

075the data points here. I will tell you that many of the things that you would hope are happening. They're they're you know things are on the upswing where they should be on the upswing and things are on the downswing in places like chronic absenteeism and things like that. Um but really the point of presenting this to you is so that you know that you have these are all um really data points that are covered in so many other reports that we do for you throughout the year. So to repeat them here would be really redundant but it is nice to highlight that this report exists. It might be something great during budget time to have at the ready if you have it printed out and you have a question about something, but I can imagine,

076you know, like for questions you may have like, uh, you know, h how many of our students do graduate from high school? It's right there. It's in this report. Or how many of our students do actually continue on to college and then actually persist in college? The data point is right there. You might be doing the budget. how many of our students um utilize special services for example and you can't remember the number off the top of your head, you can go into this report and find it really quickly. So, it's like a really great like one-stop shopping kind of a report. Um like I said, produced by the state of Connecticut based on the data of course we give it, you know, we we provide they give us templates, we provide all the data

077that goes into these reports. Um, I would say another interesting way to use these reports, um, for anybody in the public or anybody on the board, um, would be to be thinking about because these reports are consistent, um, and they're archived from year to year on the state website. Um, they're a great great way from comparing like last year to this year, district to district, or district to state averages, which is sometimes helpful, too. Um, when you have questions about certain things about like how's Farmington doing? Those are three different ways that you can compare how far is doing. So it could be sort of a treasure trove of information or a starting point for a question you may have, you know, at this table or um that you're interested in. Um and I would

078say that one of the ways we use it too, and Jess sort of hinted to this in his introduction about how we are a district striving for excellence at all times. And so one of the ways we also use it is to look for bright spots. Um, and so this helps us identify places that are, you know, often we're doing well, but we also look for places that are doing really well as in these areas. Um, and to find out more about what they're doing, like why is your arts access so high? What did you do? What's going on in your school district? And what can we learn from that? Um, and other examples like that. So, um, it's a really great source of information for us. Um, it's public. It adds to sort of

079transparency and understanding what schools are all about and what they're doing. Um and then this slide I just wanted to point out there's also something that the state provides to us. Um they uh to it's called an accountability index. So they actually score every school and every district. Um and so our accountability score um is made up of all of these indicators and they really try to do something. You can see there that they didn't focus on just one area. They're trying to come up with a way to quantitatively support every district to make sure that we're leading towards like a more well-rounded students. So that's why you can see on their physical fitness scores, arts access as I mentioned before, um whether students are taking um have post-secary plans or um take college level

080courses, those kinds of things. In addition to the kinds of things that you would see on our Smarter Balance report or other state report testing that we report out to you, um some of the some of the um the the lines there are in yellow. So green is like we're really strong and yellow uh were areas where last year I sort of highlighted as areas that need to continue to grow. And I'm happy to report in every single one of those yellow categories, you will see an increase over our last year of results. in every single one of those. There's still areas I would say that we need to improve in. Um, as usual that'll I'll say that every time I present this. Um, but every single one of those saw improvement from last year.

081Um, and I'm happy to take any questions. >> Questions? Angela? >> Um, so I thought this was interesting. You know, I looked at it. Um, it was great to see some of the, you know, I just saw improvement when I was looking through it. One table I thought that thought was interesting and I want to make sure I'm reading it correctly is on page 48 the new educator attrition data. So, you know, I'm passionate that I think our educators are probably our greatest resource and asset here and good educators promote good environments to great students. Am I reading it correctly that we have almost a double attrition rate as the state average does and have we looked into that at all or delved into it as to what we can do to maybe turn that

082around to you know keep our great educators here? >> Um so one of the things I wanted to point out is you're right that is a new that is new this year as I as I said before and there's also another point there's um an appendix A that also goes along with it. >> Is that in there? >> It's also it should be in there. Yep. append appendix A and that actually presents to the reasons why people are leaving. Um and so we do ask our teachers when um they do leave for any purpose including retirement or they're just leaving um what's the purpose of their leaving and so this also is reported to the state and they report out on this and so one of the things I think is interesting here is that

083it says um one of the categories is to teach uh slashadmin in other Connecticut districts and that makes up a bulk of those teachers who are leaving. So 14. But what I thought was interesting about this is that they sort of lump in teachadmin in another Connecticut district altogether. Many of our teachers do get great leadership experience here as well or in their 092s while they're here. And many of them and I have that as anecdotal you know data um but do go on to take leadership positions in other place in other districts as well. [snorts] Um, so that's, you know, that would, uh, account for at least some of of that discrepancy between where we are and where the, you know, where the averages stay. So, >> you would say that bucket skews towards

084people actually getting leadership roles in other >> as opposed to just I know it does. Yeah. >> Okay. >> It's not all of it, but that's a big part of that story. >> I missed that chart. Thank you. I'll look at this a little bit more, too. Erica. >> Oh, sorry. Okay. So, I have a couple. Um, so if we can start off with the chronic absenteeism and just to make sure and I know that the aster tends to be uh it defined as it's suppressed to ensure the the number was low and to ensure the confidentiality, right? Because it would be identifiable. But am I reading this correctly? Female. I always bring it back to the anyway. Yeah. Chronic absenteeism. female chronic account has an asterk the rate aster make sure I'm reading that

085correctly. So that means that there was a significantly low rate of chronic absentism among females in our school population compared to our male. >> What page are you on? >> I'm sorry. Uh >> 47. Yeah. >> Um I don't know why that data is suppressed. that happens every once in a while where it sort of looks like an error and it cannot be true that it's low because if you look at the overall district average is 8.4 which would indicate actually females are actually more absent than males who have an average of 8.3. >> So it so girls must have an average chronic absentee uh rate of 8.5 if you're looking at that. So I don't know exactly why sometimes this happened on other reports before that I and I can't explain it. I don't

086really know why sometimes that something like that is suppressed because learn that you know I saw that let's say all Afric >> right So that intersectionality that could expensive like the number potentially be able to identify there being multiple so it's there >> number would be suppressed >> suppress the one that's probably got the highest number >> yeah I know that I'm not sure But I think what you get is that you know potentially >> yeah so I think with that explanation though just because you know I do know many of us look at these profiles you know and especially when you're moving into a town I mean that could be um further explained in the way that you explained it maybe next to that on the left hand side under the notes you know

087details of maybe one I don't some a suggestion for the state. [laughter] >> Um that's one and then um the other one is around the suspensions suspension counts. I still you know I will always say this year after year after year and this is across the board across our whole state suspension of males >> pretty significant you know that to me is a significant concern. And then when you you know drill down into that you know uh the students with disabilities uh suspended you know you can drill down further into all of that. Is that a target population and sort of what are we doing in the sense of responding to to that? Um and then um so for high school students with disabilities oh the other one around the students with disabilities for outplacement

088and in placement and that's on slide let me just make sure sorry I think that's 50 >> uh placement with disabilities or students with disabilities placed outside of the district. So, and I know that this tends to be during the budget time area where this is a significant cost for all districts across the board. Um, you know, ours as well. Um but just for a point of clarification and I always I'm always make a comment like this too not necessarily here but in my professional setting that you know when you say private schools it's kind of a again sort of that misunder misunderstanding about these I I think would you clarify for me that that term that the way they're defining private schools under uh students with disabilities placed outside of the district. It's not

089your like Miss Porters. It's not correct. I just want to correct it's not your you know families have chosen to take their child and put them in a in a private educ um so those are the places but you're you are correct those are it's just it's based on what the holistic environment for individuals with disabilities I just and I think that that you know accounts to the cost overall I think we all need to be mindful of that um as well um but just you know making a note for that for when budget's time comes because that is such a critical part in our budget and then um oh and then there was another one about emotional uh when it looks into the reasons >> um you know and I know we talk and

090the school does a great job um around social emotional learning but and I know that Farmington has that new uh partnership with the behavioral health therapeutic or behavioral health counseling Right. Um can't remember what we call that. Um in uh that we piloted the high school. >> Yeah. The high school that we just I think last year was the first year we piloted. I would love to hear to have them come back who uh I think was Dr. Ross with the name of the the psychiatrist. Yeah. To come back and to hear from them, you know, um how successful that's working. Are they seeing utilization? um it is such an important need across the the country for uh behavioral health services and the fact that we have such a unique partnership is really really something

091that's makes pharmaceut stand out in the state. So it would be great to hear um from from them how that partnership is going. >> And Erica you have some great questions and I know that um schools use this data as well when we develop our plans for the coming year. So uh and those are presented in the fall I believe. Yep. Um and so when you hear that there should be direct correlations to some of these data points. Um so when you talk about an example like suspension like what is our plan as a district to address those specific points >> and that would be in culture and climate and school development plans. Uh I do want to take the chance though to say that you know when we were talking about you know even

092chronic absenteeism um last year was 8.6 six. This year it's 8.4. So that's not a huge reduction, but it's a reduction, but compared to the state it's 17.2. So that really is still a lingering number from COVID times being that high. And we've really been able to curtail that over time. And um so again, we don't ever want it to be, you know, 8.4. We want of our students uh in school all the time, but you know, comparatively, we're doing really well there. And I would like to also point out on the suspension count, last year it was 133 and and this one was 85. So again, when I said things are trending in the right direction, there's another example of it. >> Yeah. And that and that's great. I think um you know, that's

093that's another great example of, you know, where um where were we last year? And you know, we don't have that one in front of us. We have what we have, >> you know, but where were we? What's the comparison, I guess, from the year before. Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you. >> And I I'm just going to guess we have these posted on our website. I didn't actually go through those, but that is a place. So for new board members, if you'd like to go back, you should be able to access the 232 24 version 20, you know, now you have the 2425 and so you can go back in past years and you can look at some of that data over time. >> Yeah. And just another, you know, sort of online resource. I know

094you have two, there's a lot, so I wouldn't expect you to go back to the source and look at it, but Edsite, it's edsi ght.gov, ct.gov, has all of this data on it as well with really nice visualizations where you can like compare different things. So you can go on there and see um even more information than they even are able to put on this report. There's a lot more even information on there and they archive it for many many years. I mean it goes back over a decade of of information um related to these indicators. >> Any more questions or comments? Okay, thank you, Veronica. Um, next item is uh we're on 6F now. Professional appointments, resignations, and retirements. So, included in your packet this evening are the appointments, resignations. Uh there's no mention

095of professional development activities for this month. Um, but for uh January to date, we have an a professional appointment of Caitlyn Duffy, who's been appointed as a language arts teacher at IR Middle School. Uh, and a resignation of Janelle Lovig. I say that correctly. Um, a special education teacher at Farmington High School effective January 13, 2026. Um, next item on the agenda 6G is deeper learning updates. So, each month we include these deeper learning updates in the packet uh for the board to review, but also for the community to see the um incredible efforts taking place in all seven of our schools um to work towards a level of deeper learning for our students. Uh since we're at uh I won't go through all of them. they are included for you to review. But since

096we're at IAR this evening, uh I just wanted to briefly highlight one example uh that I enjoyed reading about which was uh students comparing marketing strategies uh that PT Barnum used uh back in the day uh and comparing those to techniques uh used by social media influencers today. So if we think about deeper learning, I think that's a great example. Uh and that's tied to the uh Pide Hidea project here at the [laughter] AR. Um but again, those are included for you to review uh and enjoy. >> Uh next item seven, unfinished business, a budget impact, budget update. So, uh, you know, this is a time of year where we're probably focusing so much on next year's budget that we forget that we actually still have a current budget that we're managing and and operating

097through. Um, you know, having said that, you know, I I uh we don't really have anything, you know, uh, you know, exciting or major. We're we're kind of moving along. Things are kind of right where they should be and we're we're we're kind of in a good place. Uh but happy to you know answer any questions about this year's current budget that everybody has. >> All right. Uh next item is eight new business uh approval of the educational specifications for the Irving A. Robbins Middle School asbestos flooring abatement project. So hang on there. >> I need a motion. >> Uh I move to approve the educational specifications for the Irving A. Robbins Middle School as best flooring update project as presented. >> Second. Any discussion? So just to provide some context for this, the Irving

098uh Robins flooring project was something that had been approved or is approved in the capital budget uh project budget. Uh we're looking to move forward. Uh probably a little bit kind of like the Noah Wallace uh you know sometimes you you you do some sampling and you think you're all good with abatement and then you you know poke around a little more and you find out that you know uh oh and then you have a spot. So, uh, there was going to be some abatement needed. So, uh, the, you know, we never say kind of that's not the, you know, the bad news, but the good news though is because it needed abatement, it then made it eligible for state reimbursement. So, what we were able to do is kind of uh, in essence, but

099in order to do that, we had to kind of restructure it and submit it to the state. In order to do that, the town needed to first approve. So, uh, at last month's town council meeting, they approved to create it as a separate project from, you know, as in and the other codes we have, it has to be its own separate project that's that's in there. Um, and so it needed, you know, that like said that approval. Once they did that, they also then shifted money from structural and architectural and code and safety. So, we took some of the money from one, some of the money from the other that we were using for the flooring project, putting it in there. uh we found some other uh you know capital money in there and so

100really the cost of the abatement will probably end up getting uh offset by the reimbursement we'll get from the state. So I I do think there's you know going to be a little bit more we have to pay but once again the reimbursement is going to kind of offset that. So we should still be able to stay pretty close to to kind of the budgetary numbers that we wanted. So it won't have a huge impact there. But now this is kind of the procedural. So the town council did their piece. Uh we're looking for the board of ed to uh uh you know make this motion approve that so we can submit it to the state and keep moving forward uh so we can make our timeline of getting the work done this summer. Happy

101to take any questions. >> Angela, >> is the reimbursement from the state guaranteed? I feel like with some of these projects it's like we think we're getting the reimbursement but then we hear you know later on that something happened, it didn't go through, we weren't awarded it. So, is this one of those examples where we're hoping we get a reimbursement? And what percentage or amount is that or is this one where we're guaranteed to get the reimbursement? >> Sure. So, there there's there's two different kinds of projects. So, like the high school project is is is one that is voted on by the legislature as as part of the larger projects in June every year. Um, this because what we're saying is it's a it's an abatement. That's one of the categories that do not

102need to be approved by the legislature. They have a bank of dollars. So when when town council appropriated the money in a separate account for us, they had three motions that they put together as well. One to make the board of education as the building project for the committee. Uh one to authorize us to put together schematic designs for the project and then the other is to authorize the BOE to apply for grant status. So is it guaranteed that they approve the grant? No. But once they approve the grant, then you are guaranteed for the amount that they say is eligible to be to be reimbursed for that portion of the project, which >> I think it's like 32.7% is Farmington's eligibility for for reimbursement. There's a whole formula in the town. So some towns

103get a little more, some towns get a little less. Farmington's currently, I believe, is 32.7. So, we would get 32.7 if it gets approved, but we're not guaranteed the approval. >> And and what's important to know is 32.7% of the eligible parts. There's some parts of that project that the state's going, we're not going to reimburse you for that. Like the, you know, it should be 32.7% of the abatement of it. And I believe there's some maybe some other parts that we can get some reimbursement for. Anywhere we have to anywhere we have to abate the floors, they're going to look at the portion of the project where you abate your you requatement is required and the refflowing in those areas will also be reimburseable. But where we have the addition in 1992 I think

104at Irving Robbins those areas um do not have abatement associated. So that 35% of the foreign will not be reimburseable. Um I've never seen it where a project that is reimburseable uh such as an abatement a roof project um I've never seen it where they didn't get approved by the state. >> Okay. Awesome. >> And so I just also want to maybe clarify for when we talk about state grants uh for special education excess cost grant. That's one where they kind of tell you you're going to get this percentage over that four and a half times but then you're never quite sure. you know, they tell, you know, the statute says it's 100%, but it's never 100%. Sometimes it's 65%, 70%, you know, and that's where last year, remember, they gave us that extra. >>

105Yeah, this is different than that. >> This this this one is is, you know, uh I'd say exceptionally reliable. Okay. >> For for for reimbursing the eligible cost. >> Okay, perfect. Thank you. >> Other questions? >> So, we have a motion. We have a second. So, all those in favor? I >> I >> opposed. Extensions. Motion carries. >> Next item B, capital improvement budget 2627. 2026 2027. >> I move to approve the 2026 2027 capital funding projects as presented. >> Second. >> Okay. Discussion. >> Great. Uh happy to to work you through. Um once again this kind of also talks a little bit Andrea you were talking about like you know the the prior report here. We utilize this as well as some of the other um you know kind of drivers of of how

106we develop our our capital projects uh uh piece in there. And uh once again I'm going to go probably a little bit quick just for sake of time and also because I believe you may have seen the presentation in there. And so some of the highlights, you know, obviously for the last couple years, uh obviously the high school and the central office, um some cafeteria equipment uh replacements, the RTU over at I the West roof, which was a big project that we completed uh last year. Uh then you know some of the uh switches at this point network once again maintaining the the critical technology infrastructure. Uh there's a lot of classroom AV upgrades. the displays here I all updated and once again part of that that premier security review um which you know as

107we said we could probably see you know within a year or two probably us putting in uh a prior review that's kind of uh you know kind of a next level work uh once again sometimes we always have those unanticipated things so you know union school ceiling pipe insulation abatement you know wall staff room floor abatement IR classroom floor abatement so some things there uh that cut off the in process It is. >> Oh, >> go back. Go back to the slid. >> Oh, got it. >> Oh, thank you. >> Got it. Um, you know, currently we are working uh with Landmark Architecture to uh give us schematics for elementary HVAC designs uh which we'll talk about uh later in this presentation. Uh we're currently working is to get a Union cafeteria main office design

108and that one they're actually looking at variety of like a kind of small medium big type of renovation to see and so when we have that we'll move forward presenting that and then the all famous AR gener generator transfer switch um that we all know and love. Uh that one actually just got installed last week, >> Thursday, correct? >> And now we're just looking for some time when school's not in session, maybe February break, April vacation, somewhere in there where we need everything offline so we can switch it over and then that project will uh happily be completed in there. So um that's just kind of some of the highlights and kind of where we're going. You know, once again, uh for those just a reminder, these are the big buckets. Uh so for example

109that IR flooring was across school coded safety structural architectural we then moved it so it's in its own uh basically it'll be in its own bucket. So for technology uh recommending $550,000 here are some of the projects looking to include security 175,000 and just as a reminder especially for some new board members one of the terms we use is banking. So sometimes we will put money in the capital project because maybe uh you know a project is going to be $200,000 and we don't want to put that all in one shot. So maybe we'll put $50,000 in the capital budget for you know every year for four years until we can get to that. So then we can complete that project and this way kind of be able to do it over time. Here are

110uh security some of the projects we're looking to do code and safety compliance will be able to see some of those projects we're talking about the west district plumbing structural spectral And this is your eye vision test for the night. If you want to see this is the pay for HVAC projects kind of broke it down. Um we had initially and I'll have these guys help me out. We had initially uh kind of looked and kind of banked or not banked, we kind of estimated it being about $16 million for you know $4 million for each school. uh looking at that right now the estimates are coming in uh you know even when we close they have to do some things uh you know I'll say under that uh you know kind of looking at

111that one of the questions that between Florida and the town we'll have to kind of decide is that has it kind of built in with escalation cost as you can imagine with you know inflation every year things and materials cost and so trying to figure out what something will cost four years from now can be kind of difficult so there's some estimating in there um but one of the uh questions or decisions that might need to get made is uh the possibility of looking to do uh all four of the projects maybe across two years. We think trying to do it all in one year, all four schools might be overly ambitious, but we want to make sure that we tend to kind of build some things. Uh but doing it in two years could

112potentially bring some of the uh you know that escalation costs that that are there out uh a little bit you know you know a little bit more known. It's easier to predict two years out than four years out. uh obviously uh and and taking a look at that, but that's something that I know has been uh discussed over the past couple years about K4 Hback. Um and so that is where we currently are with that. Um once again some outyear projects uh that we're looking at and here is would be the summary um excluding the HVAC projects at the you know 14 million and change capital looking at 1.15 million uh for for those current projects that have oh sorry here's our seven mapping out >> any question. >> Angela, >> sorry. Okay. So, um

113I know uh okay, two questions. One, I'll table for a second. The technology infrastructure, I was surprised to see an increase in that just because I would have thought with the FHS being new and maybe seeing like nothing. I'm assuming none of that's going towards FHS considering that's like brand new, but Correct me if I'm wrong. What is the increase coming from? Because I would have thought we would have seen savings because we weren't applying any of that. I would assume technology infrastructure to FHS because it's brand new and we're still seeing an increase when that whole building in my thought process would be not included in this. >> Sure. I'm going to defer Matt. >> Yeah. So, um, we used that, uh, the technology capital to help fund, uh, the new switch gear and

114wireless access points at the new high school, uh, during the building. That was because the reimbursement rate was higher if I did it through BA and utilize capital dollars. What you see here, many of these items are uh, like sub banking accounts. So, uh, core infrastructure and servers is stuff that a little bit of money is put in each year and we I work closely with my counterpart on the town side. We actually have shared infrastructure and we're up or due in the next year for replacement. So, we've been banking money along. The 550 is actually below the the projection. So, our current projections over the next seven years is about $575,000 each year in technology and that cuts across the entire district and it's based on a schedule of projects that I've identified and

115estimated costs over the course of those. And I adjust when I when I bring my proposal forward, I adjust based on cost estimates and also what's truly achievable in the summertime or over the course of the next year. Um so the 550 is is slightly below the 575 estimate. Uh some key items that that are in there for this coming year are uh we continue to do data wiring projects. Last summer, uh, Westwoods was funded through capital for a complete rewire of the building. Um, this summer, I'm looking at Irving Robins, which doesn't need a complete rewire, but we are looking at a refresh of wireless access points now at all of our other schools other than the high school. And in order to do that, we're going to one access point per classroom. So,

116I have to add additional wiring into the building in order to accomplish that. the uh that funding this capital funding gets paired with e-ate reimbursement which is of for us currently it's 40%. So I I put through an RFP through USA which is the the the US agency that manages that that they approve we purchase but it each year we chip away all of it. So, it's it's not while there isn't a whole lot in here for the high school for this year. True, because we we just built the new high school, there's a lot in here that is being applied to the other six schools moving forward. >> Okay. Um and then just from my understanding because I feel like I always see this these MEP the mechanical ventilation projects. So, that's separate. Can

117someone just explain that again because I feel like I get confused with it. So, we're voting on the like the slide where Yeah. We're not voting on that total number. Are are you saying you want to put this into the total number this year? This 14 million. >> Like I'm confused by that HP with the 14 million. >> Say that one more time. >> I It sounds like you're talking about the 14 million about how how that >> Yeah, because then So that would be like that's like an extra that's like a special project that you guys are talking about. We talked about that last year too, but then it didn't come to fruition. So, what are how is that included in here? I'm just a little confused. So, last year the town council approved

118for this the 1.3 million. >> Yeah. >> The 1.3 million there. But now this year, because you're including that MEP ventilation project, you're saying that bucket's going to be 15 million. Am I reading that correctly? >> So, last >> Yeah. So the the because that we're looking at those H track projects as state reimbursible, they end up having to be called out as separate items. The town at that dollar level, the town tends to prefer to bond that that money. What we're proposing is the here's the dollar figure. We continue to work with Joe Spike on how they want to structure the financing. They, you know, they may say we're going to bond over uh over four years. We're going to bond it over two years and split it out. The the town council and

119the finance director kind of they make that decision. We put forward the total dollar amount in last year's capital uh uh seven-year projection. Each one of those line items had 4 million in it. We've now adjusted it based on our current cost estimate. So yes, what you're approving is 1.15 million in cash capital dollars and the project 14 and change that the town council and Joe the finance director they'll decide how they'll they may bond that but we're asking for the full approval of it up front. >> And is that how it was done last year? >> They didn't approve it last year like for the seven year. we just kind of like put it on their radar like hey this year we're going to be asking for this really large sum and so for

120them to kind because they might also then have some other projects uh you know please fire department something else and so they going to they're going to want to try to figure out okay how do how do they space this out you know for for all their various projects so that's why we try to work with them to say hey just so you know this is where we're going and so they see that sevenyear out and know that uh you know >> a similar example in 2728 you see 1.2 million there which is which we're projecting from the union cafeteria. So that's not being approved as giving us that money this year. That's us projecting out that that we're expecting to come to you and then the town council next year with something close to

121that as we're working through getting getting our estimates. >> Okay. Yeah. I'd have to I'm going to have to look at last year to just kind of reenter myself with it. up. But when you say reimbursement again, these are not 100% reimburseable. >> So yeah, so that that's you're touching the point that I was going to add on. We didn't present these last year because the state had ended the 2-year grant process that had all sorts of stipulations with it that were going to make it difficult for us to get it done through that grant program. But in the meanwhile, the legislature has added HBAC as a reimburseable project. So, similar to a pavement or a roof, HBAC project uh upgrades are now a reimburseable uh category for state reimbursement, school construction grant reimbursement. And

122so that's why we're bringing it forward as four separate projects >> in more of a reimbursement like you had related to how you you talked about the abatement reimbursement because previously there's been discussion about reimbursement but then you guys have come back and said we didn't get it like we applied for a grant I thought for some reimbursement and then we never got >> because because for two years it was a competitive grant process and the competitive grant had stipulations such as you have to have the money already which benefits a town that are that doesn't have to go to a referendum, but it's very difficult for a town like Farmington that that has to go and put something forward at referendum. Also, a stipulation you had to be done within a year and a

123half with the project. So, that made it difficult for us to say we were going to have four HBAC upgrades done in a year and a half. It just wasn't feasible. >> Yeah. Now, it's in a different, for lack of better words, it's in a different uh grant, different bucket, different category. So, there's a different set of rules. It's the rules that are more aligned with a school construction like the high school, like we're going to do with the IR flooring. So, it's whatever's eligible for reimbursement should be around that 32.7. You know, they might, you know, I don't know if they lock in the reimbursement. I think it fluctuates a little bit every year, >> but they post every but it's usually within that range. So, so we're hoping that you're the eligible pieces

124of those projects that we'll be able to get around 32%. Okay. Yeah, still a lot to wrap my head around that. Yeah, that's good. Thank you. I appreciate it. >> I I just wanted to comment on then I'll get to you, Matt. So, what we're looking at tonight is what uh is recommended um for capital improvement requests and what if we approve this, it goes forward to the town council, I believe on January 27th, where 27th where it'll get presented to the town council and as Sam and Dan indicated, >> the council really decides what >> correct >> what they're going to do with the money and how they're going to spend it. And in this budget, they're able to say what can be what the money can be spent on in the in the

125capital versus in operating they can reduce but the superintendent makes recommendations of where that would happen. >> Correct. >> Without getting too technical about it. Yes. >> All right. [laughter] >> Yes. that the the town council has the perview when it comes to capital to direct us into which areas they would like to see cut and specific dollar amounts. Usually still based on our recommendations, but but more especially when it comes to these larger bonding projects, they have that purview to decide whether or not forward. >> Matt, >> yeah, thank you. Um so the 14,339,000 is that the gross or is that after the anticipated state reimbursement >> gross? >> Okay. So in theory if we get reimbursed 30% the actual the net is 30% less than that the town of Farmington would have to

126pay >> without getting into that ineligible >> not there will be portions where they'll say this is ineligible. >> Sure. Um, so but yes, the anticipated grant reimbursement is approximately 32% of that. >> Got it. Second question. Right. We're we're just approving the 14 million. It sound it still sounds like the construction years may change versus what's on this page. Right. Just dialing in that and curious how you decided, you know, West District is year one and East Farms year two. How how do you think about that? So the primary reason we identified West District as the uh first school to complete is if you remember we were able to use some of the excess funding from cafeteria funding to use improvements and so we were able to put HVAC upgrades at all three of

127the other elementary schools so that they are cafeterias have uh HVAC and C in them. West District we did submit the same thing getting to a long detailed story of it. the state actually approved us to do that project as we were moving along the project halfway through they said uh actually no uh we changed our mind you're not eligible for it so we had to uh stop that project wasn't you know lost money or anything in there but it it we weren't allowed to move forward with that project unless we did it as either a major project that operating or capital budget but we couldn't use our excess funding in there so having that um I don't want to say putting West district at a disadvantage. Felt that we wanted to kind of put

128them uh first um and and looking at at that piece of it. The other one that you know we're still kind of looking at with Union is you know with the potential renovation there to see how that might play out that kind of might um you know see where maybe there might be some intersectionality in there. And so so that he's kind of looking at there regardless. I think right now what we're finding out from Landmark who's who's overseeing and kind of giving schematics is all the four schools are going to need some electrical upgrades. Um and so the thought process is to be able to kind of get this well we'll probably do it mostly a summer project is if if we wanted to do this as a uh two-year project or sooner. It

129might be where we we potentially might do once again we wouldn't do all four schools in one year but potentially it's do all the electrical upgrades for all four schools during one summer and then the next summer do the actual installation of the thing and then maybe even get them all at the same time. So that's just one I'll say theory hypothesis. We're still kind of working out those you know working with Landmark to kind of see where where uh what would be the best course of action on that. >> Yeah. Just one followup if that's okay. Right. So my next question was it sort of looks on the page like it's four separate projects, right? Where it's four separate schools, but it sounds like there's a benefit to thinking about these as just one

130big district-wide project, right? That happens to be four four different schools. Is that how you're looking at it when you're thinking about the construction management of this? If there are benefits to thinking about this as one district project that happens to be a four buildings. [laughter] >> One re one reason that you would want to put it forward as four projects is that you're touching every bit of town. Everybody every student that goes to that grade level, they see their school uh as being part of that as opposed to going four separate times and asking people who may not be as vested in that school um a particular school that's on the ballot as public. Uh so that's one reason I would do it. I'm not sure how much economies of scale we'll get out

131of it. There's there's probably not a lot of larger contractors that will try to take on four projects of this size uh at the same time. We'll probably have various contractors. Uh perhaps you get somebody that does two of them. What we did see is when we put out the design um is that we had one comp one designer Landmark facilities group that was significantly lower as a bid package for all four than they were individually for the four. So we did save some money on the design itself that way. Although it was also interesting to note there was one firm who did not want to even try to project you know estimate three or four years and they're like no we want you know we can't kind of give you that kind of estimate

132because we don't even have a no we don't even want to give you an idea. So so those are some of the other challenges of of kind of there. So, um, like you said, you know, right now, you know, we're working with Landmark. They've kind of given us estimates. We wanted to make sure that we had a good, you know, kind of outline to estimate. You know, like you said, last year it was kind of just 4 million, four million, four million, four million just as kind of a placeholder. You could see that there is some variance across schools, one over four million, you know, one still under three million. Uh, and so still, you know, like I said, you know, I I don't want to ever uh uh not acknowledge one and a half

133million dollars, but still kind of within that ballpark. It's not like it's cut in half. It's not double as price, right? It's still within there. And there still might be, you know, some escalation up or down, uh, you know, with that piece of it, and but we wanted to make sure for for budget time we had a number that we felt comfortable moving forward with. Actually, Matt Matt just reminded me as well the other part of this which fits in with your question is that for state reimbursement, these need to be four separate projects. Uh they'll need to see force four individual schools and costs listed on on even if you go for referendum for 14 million. You'll have to say how much for each project as well, >> but it'll still be one person

134overseeing the project over here. So, you know, there you have >> Andrea, just to clarify, so we're calling it the ventilation. Is this complete air conditioning in the entire building? Like like I to be honest, I'm thrown off a little bit, but I I just wasn't this wasn't on my radar for tonight. Um because I feel like we're still paying off the high school. Like this is that what this is? Is this the full AC in the build? What what is this exactly? >> So So the focus of this project is to bring fresh air conditioned In other words, dehumidified and and tempered fresh air into the building uh into the classrooms. So this is a classroom focused project. Um and then so that's done by one system and then another system will do air

135conditioning within the classrooms as well. So there was but but it will still be a system where we can add on other areas of the building. Potentially this wouldn't touch certain offices or um you know we're we're aironditioned in most libraries at this point. So, so it doesn't really interrupt with the Union Library expansion. Um, >> so we'll dam cafeteria, air conditioning, have those. Some main offices are there. So, yeah. So, the primary focus is classrooms uh in there. Uh but it does also then have the you know and uh you'll probably like as part of like what we talk about the scope you know of the continued there may be you know out three five years a major project or capital project that is a um I can't think of a good example but

136a section you know maybe a few uh department uh offices that weren't air conditioned that we would be able to just put a unit in that doesn't need the electrical upgrade doesn't you know you know it has pretty much everything there. It's really just kind of maybe adding, you know, with it a rooftop unit or or something in there. But that, you know, once again, the structure is there. So the cost of it would be, you know, more on a major project, maybe capital, but most likely a major project to add to build on to to those pieces, but the focus is on the class. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. >> Additional questions, comments? >> Okay. >> So, we have a motion and a second. All those in favor? >> I opposed. >> I'm going

137to abstain. Andrea. >> Okay. So, eight in favor, none opposed, and one abstension. Next, next item. Uh, where are we now? C. Approval of two-year charge of standing committees. I move to approve the board of education committee charges as presented. >> Second discussion. >> Um I don't know who's in charge of the the slides. >> Oh, it's Yeah, it's I don't think that they're not. >> Uh they're there. Yeah. Yeah, there. >> Yeah, they're there. All right. Um any questions or uh discussion about the charges? Um, we have four standing committees, personnel negotiations, policy, curriculum, and communications. Um, later this evening, I'll um hand out um a a document where you can prioritize which committees you have an interest in. Um, generally each committee has uh three members and one person is the chair. So,

138any questions or comments? Okay. Um, all those in favor? >> I oppose extensions. Okay. Motion carries. And next item. D. Review of the 2026 2027 school year calendar. This is a first reading. I need Yeah, I need a motion. to run this through. >> I move to approve the 2026 2027 school year calendar as presented for a first reading. >> Second. >> Great. >> Discussion. So to begin uh the calendar discussion, I think it's important, especially for our new board members, kind of take a little trip down memory lane uh to uh what's transpired this fall. And so what you see uh up on the screen, there's a few slides here that that just kind of capture um what's led us here this evening. Uh so I'll read >> Sorry, I just got the >>

139There you go. Um so this is verbose but but just to get um you know get everyone on the same page. So per calendar policy 611 and administrative regulation 611A in January the uh of each calendar year the board of education will approve a 2-year school calendar. So for this year it' be 26 27 2728 through a first and a second reading. However, at at several recent board of education meetings, uh we received public public comment from community members, including FPS students and families requesting the addition of Eid to the school year calendar as a day off for future school year calendars. During the November 11th, 2025 board of education meeting, the board by consensus recommended that the policy committee meet to discuss the impact of adding Eid as a day off in future school

140calendars. On December 4th, the policy committee met. Um I was actually able to attend that meeting um even though I was not officially in my role yet. Um and we discussed the impact of adding um the additional day off for Eid in the school year calendar. Uh and that was adding and and that would also mean us revising our regulations for the future. Um during the uh meeting the policy committee also reviewed sample two-year calendars following the current policy and administrative regulations and sample two-year calendars following the current policy and administrative regulations with the addition of Eid is a day off um and I think no go back one slide I think we're still yeah no I guess >> no recommendation >> um yeah so after a thorough review and discussion of the policy administrative

141regulation and the board's decision-making criteria for calendar approval. The policy committee recommended the following for the full board's consideration that the board of education consider um directing the superintendent to provide two calendars um along with the policy and the regulations for discussion at the full board meeting today, January 12th, 2026. Uh and so what you have uh with you tonight actually you had in the packet um what we might say is like version four or 5.0 of the calendar revisions. Um and part of that was as I began to work with the team to look through the calendar um we realized that one of uh one piece of this work is also identifying the date that some of um the holidays and cultural celebrations actually occur because they they move year to year based on

142different factors. Um and so we we looked at it say about a dozen times over the last week and so we realized um late today that there was a couple of errors on the calendar in the packet. So um D was kind enough to bring over an updated uh sample of the 2627 calendar. So you should have that um at your seats this evening. It's probably the easiest to look right at that uh because it's the most updated and accurate calendar that we have. Um, and so you'll see in the packet here, and I know we're just talking about the 2627 calendar, a version A for 2627, um, which would be in line with the current policy in administrative regulations, and then a second version which has the addition of Eid. And so really that

143difference would be in the version if you look in the month of March um on Wednesday the 10th you'll see that date highlighted in blue and blue indicates an additional holiday slash vacation day where no school is in session. You should have those too. I tried to make I tried to put them up on a slide, but again to Dan's site um you know reference, it's a little hard to read up off of the screen, but it's probably easiest to look at them um side by side in front of you. >> Um so I just wanted to comment. So the motion we have on the table is for the 2026 2027 calendar that follows our policy and regulations, our current policy and regulations. Um but we this also gives us the opportunity to discuss adding

144Eid as uh potential vacation holiday school closing. Um, so I'll open it up to questions, comments. >> All right, Beth. Um, thought maybe I'd jump in as chair of policy and just kind of also fill in some of the timeline. But um so when we met as a policy committee, we took the opportunity to have a really thorough discussion about all the different things that come into play when we're looking at adding school closure day. Um, and I appreciate Jess being there coming from a different district and having, you know, just different experience about um, this is obviously an issue that every district has to contend with and and do as a part of their their role. Um, so there there are a lot of factors that I just I think it's important for all

145of us to kind of lay out there as part of the process. Um, and just what you brought to the discussion that I thought was really helpful because I don't remember looking at it quite this way before with just looking at where we are in our district with partial weeks and this can fluctuate from year to year depending on how vacations and holidays fall and school closures and we have our professional development days that also play into this as well. Um, and correct me if I'm wrong, but what I remember you saying was we're at and I think that might have been for this current year or maybe the one that we're looking at 26 27 16 partial weeks >> that would be so we're at 15 without the addition of even we would move

146to 16 with the addition. Now that to your point that that's half days, you know, weeks where there's a holiday scheduled that's, you know, We're considering if there's a half day of school that it's a partial week. Yeah. >> Right. So full days Monday through Friday would be our full >> Friday 9 to5 >> and is that at 23 that I don't know the number of weeks in the school year but I remember 20 >> that would be like 39 total weeks you know it's it's it's not necess you know because of the way some weeks fall like a week like with Thanksgiving found in it where there might be two days of school. So the the you know we're required to have a 180 day school year per state statute. So based on how

147that falls, it's the school year being spread out over 39 weeks. >> Okay. So it's a total of 39 weeks. >> So So we're up there. um and partial weeks. I think I I bring that up because what I've heard both anecdotally and I think there's some data around it and maybe you can offer some some input there with what happens to our attendance in partial weeks. >> So that that's a tricky question to answer what um because it kind of depends on how the partial week falls. So for example, if there's a Wednesday off, you know, you're you're not as likely to see the impact on attendance as if there's a Friday or a Monday when families will take advantage and and use it to travel. Um, another thing we might see is so

148so to give you an example of that if Monday is a holiday, the Friday before that Monday we might see, you know, an impact on attendance because families are going to extend that trip. uh if you know on you know the other place we see it too though you know in full transparency is we know some of those are things we select ourselves as a district. So if we schedule like a PD day on a Friday we know that there may be an impact there. So uh school uh week with conferences for example if we have like three half days in a row we may see an impact on attendance there. I mean, you know, we want our students here every day all day. Um, but we also, you know, if you're if you're going

149to take advantage of that, that's where a family will look because we're constantly promoting that they look at the calendar and they make wise decisions about days that their students miss school. So, to give you like a specific impact, it's really it's really tricky because of how that falls. >> Wow. >> Literally falls [laughter] Somebody's trying to tell us. >> It's kind of weird. >> It's like the ghost of something. >> Might be easier to leave them down. [laughter] >> I know. >> Yeah. You might remember last year's board meeting where [laughter] this year we're getting all new gym mats. But >> pulling them off just a little bit. [laughter] >> Yeah. So, so I I wish I had a better answer for you, but it it is tricky about the I I mean I

150think what we would tell you as school leaders is >> what we know about it has more to do with where those days fall and human behavior than it does about it being a school holiday. >> Oh, right, right, right, right. But the the more partial weeks we have potential for just weeks where we may not see as strong attendance as usual. It's just one of those factors. >> I think it I think it opens up conversation and work for us to be considering as a leadership team. you know, as we're presenting these calendars to you, there's pieces that we may decide as a community, we want to add or adjust holidays, but also that we have to be aware as a leadership team presenting a calendar, what that might mean for us as we

151schedule PD days or other things that are, you know, within our control, >> right? I might have more later, but >> um Jess, can you um talk a little bit more about some of the criteria for the decision making that's in our regulations? >> Sure. There is a um there are two slides that have the the regulations up there. So there is I have lots of calendars forms. >> That one Yeah, that one's policy. should be if you keep going forward after. >> Yeah. So, no, I think that's correct. Go back one more, Dan. Yeah. So, this one, so if you look in our regulations, it's really broken up into two pieces. The first regulation you'll see up there speaks to some of these broader uh like guiding principles, if you will. So, you see

152things like optimizing learning time. So Beth, kind of to your point there, uh, you know, as we're organizing these, we're we the less disruption in the day, there's there's years where it falls where we might have several holidays in September and it might feel like a disjointed start. Um, and so what we're always looking to do is like how do we really get the most bang for our buck in terms of instructional minutes throughout the school year, right? We are, you know, you heard reference about testing and data. We were looking at our performance profile. How, you know, how do we, we know as educators, you've got like these two windows of about 11 12 weeks from like the first day of school till uh December vacation and then from like January 1st till April

153vacation and like how do we maximize time within those days? Um, you know, another one is that it's aligned with our uh our our FBS vision, mission, goals, core beliefs, equity framework, right? So, we're comparing it um you heard some of our students speak this evening to the connection and feeling recognized um as important members of the community that might be an example of something that ties to that belief. uh you'll see a couple and I really kind of pull these together about student faculty health and wellness and then like staff recruitment and retention. I you know what I would say about that is the wellness and the health piece is probably tied well to that they're strategically planned breaks right like throughout the year that um you know when you look at traditionally well

154I think many districts moved away from like a February vacation is we had this long vacation in December and beginning of January and then again you know four or five weeks later we were taking another week week off when we might not necessarily need it. Uh and so that those are carefully spaced out. And the teacher and recruitment piece is really tied to uh you know as an educator myself and married to a teacher and and then two children who are in a different school system that we're working to you know be on the same page with other districts in Connecticut so that families are you know having the same I you know I would say from a recruitment standpoint however um and we kind of talked about we you know we're talking through some

155of these today. You'd have to get pretty extreme, I think, to have an impact on recruitment. Uh, you know, starting school October 1st and ending, you know, July 30. It would have to I would imagine it would have to be pretty extreme. Um, but I think that's the um that's the spirit of that. You talk about facilities, you know, as as Dan, Matt, and Sam, you know, spoke about this evening, that's the time we get our projects done is in the summer. And some of those projects take an extended period of time, right? And so we need we need to shut down schools um quite frankly to to be able to do that work under our you know current plans. Obviously being aligned with law and state statutes. So 180 days um you know a

156lot of them speak to not going beyond June 30th in terms of you know the end of of the school year. And then you see down at the you know also included there is like community feedback. We heard a lot of community feedback over the last couple months um about uh you know our us considering the addition of the Eid holiday in our calendar. Then really you know the the kind of all other duties as a sign like all other considerations that might impact our decision to adjust or make changes to our calendar. So those are like the guiding principles if you will. And then if you go to that next page, Dan, this is where um you know when we think about uh you know sitting down and putting a plan together, it gets

157into this is where the regulations if you know we are to move forward would most likely need an update because you see some that would not need to change. You know school beginning on the Monday prior to uh Labor Day. Um but there are specific references in this document that speak to those um holidays uh in which school would not be in session. So we'd be looking to make revisions. So this was last revised um a couple of years ago with the addition of Dewali um to the school calendar. questions, comments. >> Um, so I just preface this by saying obviously I support professional development PDS. I was just curious, I do a count here, seven of the weeks that Beth mentioned that are partial are due to PD days, right? I was curious how

158how do you think about scheduling those or is there a minimum number a maximum number fitting those in to this sort of web of 180 days or so? >> Yeah, good question. So, you know, Farmington certainly opted to take this approach of spacing out these um and they're not actually a half day, they're like a partial day. So there's, you know, a shortened day, I guess, is is the best way to describe them, uh, to to space them out. And it is somewhat front-loaded, as you can see. Uh, you know, again, most school leaders will tell you that if just like we're thinking about for our students about that first bullet about optimizing learning time. Um, we know the best time to do that for our staff is at the beginning of a school year

159as much as we can. Uh, and so you'll see that pretty heavy at the beginning. Um but then we do need opportunities throughout the year to touch base with them to continue the momentum um and have followth through on any training. Um what's interesting is the you know we've got this approach where we take the two backtoback days and the idea of that is so that it's connected and we can really build from day one in day two and it's not that I get some information today I don't hear about this again for weeks to come you know um Matt to answer your question I mean I I think that what we would really be charged to do is as we continue to think about changes we may want to make to the calendar. We're

160going to have to be looking at things like those half PD days and deciding if we have to make tweaks, move them, what other ideas we might like. That is something that is a piece we would have control over. Um if that makes sense. >> I just wanted to comment on that before I forget. So, you know, some of uh these holidays that we have um they move from year to year. Correct. >> So, what you're saying is >> if if some of these move well they are going to move from year to year and when you do present >> the calendars >> you might consider moving when we do PD. >> Yes. So, so that's an interesting piece of this. So, one of the things that we looked at as a team was based

161on the uh and and one of our students spoke to this this evening that interestingly enough this year um it lunar new year I think right fell on the Monday of President's Day is that was thank you sorry too many calendars swirling but um so that same is true for Yamapor Rashana Diwali and need the they also move and so some years they'll fall on a weekday and would impact you know a school day and on others they're not and so really um some work may that like a calendar may have to look different year to year based on the way they fall so we would just need some flexibility to understand that moving forward >> Erica Yeah. It's been a learning experience um listening to this and you know one of the things that

162I you know I I know each of us um on this board is we do value the voices of our young people. We value the voices of our students, value the voices of our staff on the district. So just want to make a couple comments because um it was it's very it's a place of pride to see the number of kids and students and families coming to speak during public comment. It's also at times, and I'm not sure if it's going to come out right in the way I want to say this, but at times concerning for how uh some of those comments, you know, some of the things we heard in the comments. And so I just want to take this moment because uh to to help to I hope that this helps to

163ensure our community and our students and our families that um their voices absolutely matter and you know that we have a you explained the process. You explained our policy and our process for how we take holidays or you know cultural representation into consideration into our calendar. So there is a policy, there is a process and those things are very important to keep it's because that helps to create consistency in our educational environment and create consistency in our community and environment, right? And so I just want to be very clear that this board even with I I believe from what I've learned of even the new boards board members, excuse me, and then the previous representation of the board um you know, we're not ignoring our community. We're not ignoring our students. We're trying to follow

164a process. We are also listening and we are learning. And um we're not dismissing our students. We're not dismissing our community. We're not dismissing their diverse representation. And in fact, their diverse representation and their cultural representation, their religious representation is what makes Farmington such a great community to live in. This is why we excel in Farmington. We are united and I feel just proud of that. Um, you know, so please for our community members and our students because it's so important for our students when we are up here. Um, we value your opinions. We listen to you. We are learning. And I would want that those all of those students that came to speak to know that, you know, and not to walk away from these meetings feeling like they're not being heard. They are

165being heard and we're learning about you. We're learning about who you are. We're it's just making us better and we just have to there's a process and a policy that we have to adhere to. Um and so with that I just felt like I you know each of these months I I felt like we you know it's hard for us to comment because there is a policy around that as well. Um so just wanted to take this time because we are considering this two-year um calendar and it is that's the other thing I want to make sure we put on record. we have a policy. It's a two-year calendar and I hope that it's not something that we um adjust um you know uh because I think our families and our students um that creates

166consistency in our schedules as well in our day-to-day lives. And so to have a two-year calendar to see and be able to anticipate ahead is also very critical for planning purposes for families and so forth and for our educators and our students. >> Erica, can I just stop you for a sec? Um we need to uh we need to move past 10 o'clock. So um I make I move to uh extend this meeting past 10 o'clock. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I I >> sorry to interrupt. >> Okay. Motion passes. We'll move past 10. >> Can you go? >> So yes. So I guess I I'll end with that. I guess I it's it is important. You know, each of us are volunteers. We volunteer for a reason. We're passionate for this.

167We're passionate about our students and we're proud of our community. who are proud of our students and our families that support our students and our educators and support our students. So um this is not an easy lift. This is a very difficult lift and um um I'm happy that we're here and having this conversation but just wanted to clarify on that and thank you for explaining the process and what to consider. So some of the things too in the sense of you know when we add when we talk about adjustment of the calendar the calendar either to add or take away a day um what so what are the implications of all of these snow days you know so we are required by law 180 days right so how far out does that put us

168if we were to have multiple snow days adding you know how far does that put us out and also considering the fact that not all of our buildings have air conditioning to your point earlier here. None of our not all of our uh our buildings have air conditioning. I my family went to West District and I remember when we had those heat waves those few years that whatever it was, we had to put those big fans in the hallways, we had to leave or I mean it was stifling hot and I know we're going to >> fix that but not every space and so forth. And so what does that put us out? I mean how far out would we be going if we were talking about snow days and adding days? So, good question.

169The the snow day piece is a hard one to answer. Um because uh but I will tell you I've never paid attention to the weather so much my entire um but it so what we looked at was when like and again so we're we're we've we've been in communication with representatives of you know like each of these subsets of our community to inform us because of the movement of the holidays. And so, you know, again, we as we project out and I think I'm I'm, you know, I think it was like safe to say that we we can go out so far. I know Dan, you you had, you know, looked into this a little bit, but but based on where we kind of went out and felt safe, the the first time we would

170hit four all four holidays falling in the same year would be 2029 2030. That would be in the same year on a I'm sorry, let me just clarify. same year on a weekday. Um and so this past year we had three and so um if you think about that in context, the last day of school I believe was scheduled initially for like June 10th, >> right? So an additional day or two you have to like you have to look at the 2930 calendar and see where that falls and you know you may move into the next week and start to be like around like the 12th or the 13th in that year. But interestingly enough most other years again because of the movement you you might have two of the days that fall during the

171week. Sometimes you might have three. And so, you know, again, going back to some of the conversations we were having before, does that mean in some of those years that we may based on when the first day of school is, right? Because that can be the driving factor, would we have to maybe look at and consider when a target last day of school might be for us? So, we currently have a target first day of school, but we don't have a last day. And so would we have to think about like we'd really like to be finished with school by June 12th when you're throwing a date out there. And so when we do this, what does that mean we have to adjust for? Um, you know, we've had mild winters. >> It's probably not

172wood, but the last few years, but you know, this year we've already [laughter] seen a lot more action, you know, in terms of ice and snow than we have the last few years. So it's hard to know with snow days. >> So would there two more questions? So would there be any consideration in the sense of that adjusted calendar any consideration around whether the February break to reducing it to that so like so reducing it to one day or maybe would it even impact spring break and reducing some spring break dates? >> Those are certainly all things that you can consider. But what I would say though, Erica, is again, I I think we'd have to want to have some real careful thought and discussion about that because as we go back to um you

173know, max um student staff health and wellness and teacher and staff recruitment and some of those things like you know again the February um day I don't know the impact of that you know I know from past experience years that you impact April vacation like that is one of those times where we kind of need a break and you do I think you would see an impact there if you proactively impacted that. I know I've lived through years where we had so many snow days that we had to take days from April vacation and it gets messy. >> Yeah. No, and I just again I bring these questions up because we've had in the policy committee some of these are the areas in which you know consideration and discussions and just wanted to make sure

174that our community members are aware of how much thought we put into this and all the questions that we are uh you know debating about and discussing about and so forth. The other thing though sorry if you have one more just realizing >> and can I see well and just why that's important is because reducing the half PD days won't have an impact on that. you would have to look at full days and and decide, >> you know, where you might want to move. >> The other thing too is um Excel. So, we have, you know, for some, and correct me if I'm wrong because I know I I for my youngest one, I still use Excel, but um Excel is made available for during some of those holidays, right, for for families who need

175it, who are uh employed and need child care and you know, and so forth. So that that's something else that you could considerate of for this. >> Sure. I mean I I think that you know whenever school's not in session there's an impact to families with child care and you know I mean the good news is we have a close partnership with Excel. So certainly like we could communicate with them and and partner with them on changes to the calendar. I think you you the later in June you go, you know, you you would likely see an impact because camps start, you know, sooner today than it feels like they ever did and and we even sometimes when we push out late after several snow days start to see an impact there. You know, that

176that that does happen. >> Yeah. And for our community, we use a lot of parents use finding trails or they use a lot the Excel camp and so forth. So I'm sure we would have to we would coordinate all that would be another operational practice to coordinate and work with those for we do have a significant number of employed parents or working parents and um and so I I guess you know thank you for answering my questions you know I just again I just you know my last comment I think that you know so this is you know this board our board this you know is a we are listening we are paying attention and we are learning learning and and we want to take into account all the voices of the families, our students,

177the staff. Um and we want to honor the fact that we are um a good representation not only culturally, religiously, but also economically. That's another thing too. We have a diverse economic um families in in Farmington. So, you know, um all that to say, I mean, I I I support us moving this forward for a second read. Uh but I just wanted to make sure that you know some of these you know thought processes that we've been discussing are also put out there because again there is a process for this. [snorts] >> Thank you Matt. >> Just as a clarifying question are we in this motion considering calendar A or calendar B or is that part of the discussion which one we're deciding to move forward? >> So that's what I was saying before. The

178motion on the table is to to consider the calendar that current that follows our current policy and >> so calendar A >> regulations. Yes. >> Okay. >> Uh in order to um if we wanted to move forward with um calendar B, the one that includes Yeah. >> We would need an amended motion. >> Got it. I would support I would just say I would support calendar B and amending the motion. I just think for for three reasons. one I think based on the nine bullet points listed, right? I think the community sport to me outweighs sort of all of the others, right? And obviously we saw and I paid attention before I was on the court just kind of hearing that too. I we're still sort of going to school for 180 days. We're not

179reducing the number of days, right? We're just sort of adding one extra day here which is again I think something that is not as disruptive as going back to calendar A from what we heard in the community. I think that's creates more disruption in our community school setting if we stayed with calendar A. Um and I think three, you know, there's certainly I acknowledge an additional risk of a bad winter year with the you know the the floating holidays. there's four of them on a weekday. Does that certainly increase the risk of potentially going more into June or um at the worst case the messy scenario the superintendent mentioned like losing an AP April break day which no one wants to do but you know the the whatifs of those scenarios don't necessarily for me

180um prevent me from you know wanting to support B and moving forward with again everything we've just heard here in this is a public school right and just trying to think of all the students in public school so that that's where I'm at. just want that's why I wanted clarification to see how we're going. Thank you. >> Yeah. And I I'll add as well and uh Erica, Matt, Beth, I mean you guys nailed it. Every single point that you made I think are incredibly important and equally uh equally important. Um I think the the words that ring in in my head in particularly is our core values and our our beliefs in this school system. equity, inclusion, right? Um those are the things that are in it it's to our core. Um and I think

181that that is the biggest reason why I am also in in support um of that as as well as um you know the the community feedback has has been immense and and cannot be ignored. Um especially the voices of our children as as Erica stated. Um I just think we need to we need to keep that in mind. And to Matt's point, I think you you you bring up a good one, right? It's like for for this to get us into, you know, really really late June kind of a perfect storm, right? It would have to be a perfect storm of of of winter of all of the holidays hitting on the same on a weekday. Um, but I think we do have, if that were to come to fruition, I do think we have

182some levers outside of April break that we can amend as we move forward. um whether it be the start of school. I think you know Jesse bring up a good point, right? Is like we have a set first day of school, but we don't have a target last day of school, right? Why is that? What is is there something that we can potentially do there? Um I think all of those things are in in play um in the name of being equitable. >> Jess, just a quick question. So, what what James was talking about with um like we have we have a targeted first day of school. It's the Monday before Labor Day. if we ever needed to come up with like this, you know, perfect storm scenario and what is our ultimate like last

183day that we really want to consider before we go back into >> the calendar and um opening school on days that are traditionally closed. Would that require policy and regulation changes >> if you if you wanted to set like a like say like we'd really our goal would be to finish school or or target end of school by a certain date. Yeah, you you I mean I think you you would you would revise I don't know that you would need to revise the policy because it's really a practice just like your target first day of school isn't necessarily driven by the policy. It's something that's part of the regulation. The trick is the setting the start of the first day is going to be something we can be really specific about where we say it's

184the Monday um before Labor Day probably just like um some of these holidays move. I think if we were going to set a target end of year, we just want to do some thought about how that sounded in the regulation like you know like it would either be a date on or around or because I think if you get into >> saying like the second full week of June again based on the way the calendar falls that might cause that might not actually help you know you in terms of the planning process but we you know I think it would be a regular population we would state. >> Angela, >> uh, a few comments and then I do want to piggy back along with what Erica and everyone was just talking about, but a little

185bit more low hanging fruit first. Um, the yellow coding on this calendar, >> I find it a little confusing. I don't know if anyone else does. Like, as an example, December 2nd >> and through the 4th, it says like K through eight family conferences. So K through 8 would have half days, the second, the third, and the fourth. Y >> but then the next yellow one says 123 and 124 9 through 12 family conferences. So does FHS not have a half day on the second? >> So we struggled with this too. Uh [laughter] >> we struggled with this one too. So the the reason there is FHS runs studentled conferences through advisory and so they each each advisory section has about 12 students in it. So they don't need the three half days to run

186conferences. So they actually, again, you know, going back to that bullet of let's maximize instructional time, they actually advocated with us to say we only need two. So that's in response to that. In trying to group these on the same days, it's it is hard to to um mark that on the calendar. We wanted them to fall on the same days as the K8 conferences, but just pay homage to the fact that the 912 students don't need a half day on that. >> And that's fine. I don't I don't have a problem with that. Is there maybe a way to like in parentheses like K through 8 half day and then 9 through 12 half day? Because even the one on 315 to 317, is that K through six or is that K through four?

187When you say elementary, >> that's just elementary. There are no 712 conferences. So that would include Westwoods though. >> It would. So we I mean we could we could mark that K6. >> Maybe just a little bit clearer. I don't know if everyone else finds it. Okay. It's I I just thought when I looked at it, I would look quickly for the yellow and think, okay, my kids are half day those days. And it was a little bit more than you got to read into it a little bit more. >> We had played around like with like do we shade like yellow light yellow on the second. We weren't sure if that was >> I guess the hope was that the of all of our students the high schoolers would be the best to communicate

188clarity to their parents that there was >> Sure. So that was just a comment. Other comments um and I know this happened this year. >> So I don't know if we just want to get ahead of it. I know like in the fall Kathy came to us and said um we want to vote on giving a half day before Christmas Eve and then we voted on it and we did have a half day that day before Christmas Eve. I can't remember if that happened the year prior, but like if we're going to do that, why don't we just put that on the calendar as a half day for planning purposes? Is there a reason? >> I think she like it it was inadvertently not included >> in in in the previous calendar. That's why Kathy

189came to us. >> So it's not here though as a half day. >> Oh, >> saying like you're saying like the 23rd. >> That's what happened. So this year it wasn't on the calendar as a half day and then it came in like the fall and they said can you vote on this and we all said yes of course it makes sense it's a half day. >> So I just assume I don't know what I assumed. I was confused honestly because I didn't see it here either as a half day. >> So if it's normally a half day should we just include it here as a half day regulation? There's I mean I mean all I would say is there's not currently I don't believe a regulation that speaks specifically to it. I think it's

190um but it's certainly something we can include in the calendar. It's something that we're interested in. >> I just think if we're going to do it anyway, why not just be proactive about it and have for planning purposes? But that's just because it was fresh of mind because it had just happened in the fall. But again, I'm just giving the feedback. I'm not >> like playing the role of a hero. I'm not super passionate about [laughter] how, you know, we can add it on, of course. Um, and then just some comments just to go along with what Erica was saying. You know, >> I totally agree. I love hearing all the commentary. I love understanding, you know, the needs of the district, the needs of our families. Um, and I think the process is really

191important because, you know, as I'm looking at this calendar, and I like the idea that James mentioned too of maybe including a target last day because is there an average snow day amount every year because in this example for next year, two holidays, if I'm reading correctly, Dvali and Rashashana, don't fall on a weekday. So, let's say those did and then we have four snow days. That brings us to the third week. And where Erica said, I was laughing with the camps. I mean, I just put a deposit on winding trails today. Like, that's a lot of money. I I parents are not going to pull their kids from those camps to to come to school. So then do we say if in consideration of all of this if the day falls on or around

192the 15th or the 16th we're considering I think we should consider the day after Columbus Day and the the President's Day Tuesday as like kind of levers for potentially um movement some you know do we take one of those away and those do we make that a part of the policy so that when there's questions you know from families in four years in the 20 29 2030 of why am I ending on the 22nd because we had four snow days. We we have something to reference or we're looking at it and saying, well, we're anticipating the average number of snow days is three to four. If this is already the end of the year and we add on three or four days, we might be in the 20s. And I don't know if families would

193be okay with that based on camp sign up, based on family trips planned, you know. Um, I don't I'm just thinking of what Erica is saying in terms of writing down a like documenting it somewhere so that it becomes part of like the process of what we're doing because I don't think it's anyone on the board doesn't want to give a an extra day for the sake of not giving the extra day. I think it's just there's a lot of moving pieces here in terms of everything going on and I want to make sure we cover all the basis so everyone in the community understands how we got to that date. >> Yeah. And I think I I think your your point is a good one because I was thinking the same thing, right? Kicking

194this back to policy committee, right? To to kind of amend >> um sorry guys. Um having to having to amend um some of these policies and really and really look into those levers, right? And actually documenting them. I think that's important because not for nothing, we did hear another holiday uh requested tonight and we kind of figured it was coming, but if if what I just said just a few minutes ago, >> um if if I'm going to be consistent, >> right, when the next one comes, what do we say, right? We can't just say, "Oh, you get a holiday, you get a holiday, you get a," you know, like we h we have to be consistent. We have to have our approach, you know, to Erica, what you were saying earlier, right? Um, and

195just for the the public's education as well is that those policy committee meetings, I'm throwing you guys under the bus. Um, the policy committee meetings are open to the public. >> Um, and that they can you can attend and know that this board and the policy committee in particular has been taking great care um, in consideration of Eid and any other holiday that we add in this district. And I just want that to be abundantly clear um that again to your point Erica right that we do care and we are listening. Um it's very very challenging to sit here and listen to the public comment especially the kids and not be able to respond. So we're trying to respond now um and the policy committee is also responding by by putting this forth and and

196requesting the additional calendar um that we got. So >> I what I a couple of of thoughts just one is some of those we we do really have to think through. So, for example, the October 13th date, that's a teacher PD day and so that's going to fall at some point in the in the but um in terms of the February date, you know, again, we certainly could just again with with everything and and I agree with everything that's been said. Um, but just when we think about, you know, one of the questions that came up was attendance and I think again some families have gotten used to some of those dates being, you know, away. So, so I just think we have to be we have to be creative and if if anything what

197we would most need um because there's a couple of things going on. One is prove a calendar this evening with Eid. We're still for the next two school years, we're avoiding a lot of those issues that were brought up. Um, but if you know we continue to revise and think differently about our calendar as you mentioned, we're I think we're going to need to think through some flexibilities with our regulations and how maybe even how long out we can schedule calendars because we just have, you know, we're going to have to be responsive that we can we can honor what's in our regulations and and what's desired by our community and also then respond as educators to say we've got to build a calendar around that that works for everybody um including all of our

198families and you know who who celebrate different holidays because they also want consistency for their children and calendars at work and their kids to feel you know like there's some routine and schedule in the school day. So we just have to think through some of those pieces too. Um >> I mean so basically what I'm hearing just up up to this point is um support for Eid um but a lot of other considerations um and that um you know policy kind of take a look at everything that was mentioned tonight. Um it and if we get to a point where you have to bring us or when we get to a point where it's in a it's not it's too late in June, you know, for policy to look at when when that date happens

199and what other things could be considered. I don't think we're asking for anything to be removed today. I think it's just looking ahead in the future, whether it's this board or or any future board, how they're going to handle additional requests um or uh as somebody said, the perfect storm when literally everything happens on a school day and close. >> Yeah. Be positioned. Thank you. Be positioned. >> Well, you look you look at the difference between the two calendars, right? It's like if somebody's just looking at this and just saying, "Hey, what's the comparison?" Oh, it's one day. It's not a hu it's just not huge. And I don't mean to minimize just the holiday itself, right? It's just there's just there it's just not a huge impact, right? But it's I just also want

200there to be be abundantly clear that this is a slippery slope, right? When we're talking about equity and we're trying trying to be inclusive and you know, again, we heard that other request um but the president has has already kind of been set. is like how can we award this group of people with a holiday to celebrate their religious or or cultural holiday right um and not another group of people it's yeah can't yeah can't yeah do that >> and >> yeah I just want to say on that note Eid is a major religious holiday like good Friday to Bali or Hashana you'll prefer >> someone coming in asking for lunar New Year would be like me coming and saying, "Hey, we need St. Patrick's Day off because I'm Irish." I view that as a

201minor holiday, not a major religious holiday. And I think that should be the differential. And I think because Farmington has become so diverse in our population, we need to recognize that. And I think offering and giving Eid um as a school holiday is appropriate based on our population now. >> Yeah, I I I appreciate the point. Um I I think it's it's challenging to draw that line and I think that that's probably where that where, you know, policy consistency and and just being um fair um to to every walk of life in this town, right? And I I think that's um I'm I'm not sure if I would be prepared or can be prepared to say one's worth more than another, >> right? I think that's a hard distinction to make, you know. Um so

202I think that's I think it comes down to what we want to do as a board and how we want to frame it um in our policy. Um right now we've got the policy the way it is um and whether it needs to be changed. I think that just it's it's up to us to do it. Any other comments? Beth >> wanted to kind of tag on to what um James was bringing forward, the um issue of equity and how we want to recognize our diverse culture. And Ann, you just mentioned this too. It's that's where we're getting at. Um but I remember going back to the last process, so two years ago, those of us who were in discussions um and had to work through this very challenging issue. Um, the other piece of

203equity that we looked at or just talked about at least that we need to not forget when we increase school closure days throughout the school year. And I know we're still doing 180 days, but there are days where we're closed that maybe we weren't in the past or it's starting to add up. We have students that are on free and reduced lunch that may not get their meal that day. um students may be left home alone more often when we have parents choosing you know when has that age I mean I went through that when is that age you could leave students alone your child alone and if people are having child care issues or they don't participate in Excel um students with learning challenges you know they they really need a certain number of

204days per week and that consistency to really keep with their progress and what they're getting at school. Um, so I just think that's an important part of equity that is kind of the push and pull too because we're thinking about >> there's two sides to the equity argument. Um, >> economic equity >> economic >> more socioeconomic or other issues with um special services and yeah >> any other comments discussion. All right. So, do we have consensus that we want to move forward with >> uh the calendar that includes Eid as a day off? >> So, just to be clear to consider version B which includes E for it uh to be >> brought back for a second read. >> Yeah. Which which will amend the motion. >> So, I will need an amended motion. I'd

205like to amend the motion that uh the board of education consider the alternate calendar. We >> got it. We got it right on that one. >> I mean, she can >> Isn't there specific way >> amending the motion? >> Yeah. >> That we uh follow um the alternate c uh calendar for 2627 including Eid as a holiday. Second. >> Oh, all those in favor? >> I >> opposed. Motion carries. All right. So, next on the agenda, um, under the business E, review of the 2728 school calendar first reading. Can I have a motion? >> I move to approve the 2027 2028 school year calendar as presented for a first reading. >> Second. So um interestingly enough uh in 27 28 gez um there uh E does not fall on a weekday. So you know you're

206not there's doesn't matter. [laughter] I guess it's in that particular case of like you know the calendar would be that way regardless. Um and so what I would say is that you're there's only one calendar to discuss. However, um what would be brought back next time would be for a second read would be the 26 27 calendar with Eid 2728 calendar. Um, I guess Eid would would technically be listed but wouldn't be a day off from school as well as the revised regulations that would include Eid as a consideration in developing future calendars. So, I'm declared by that, >> but we can act on this motion. We don't motion. >> Yeah, because it it's either way you're you're approving the calendar. That's it. That's how the only thing I would say. Let's I just want

207to double check something real quick. I don't I think it I I don't you know I don't think there's anything to change in that calendar because on years in the past like past practice would say when Rasha Shana Yam or or Dewali did not fall on a school day you wouldn't see them listed on the calendar as a day off from school. So once we decide Eid will become a regular part of you know a regular school holiday when it falls on a Monday through Friday then on years it does it will be indicated on the calendar and years it does not just like we've done in the past with Yapor Rashana >> just a comment for me for 27 28 like the floating holidays like Good Friday is a floating h right it's always

208on Friday but the week is different, right? In some weeks it's part of our spring break and some weeks it's not. Right. So next year I think one of the reasons why school is ending even earlier is right there that spring break also includes Good Friday as well. So it's kind of two and in one if you will, >> correct? Yep. >> The opposite for >> and we would always do that unless it falls so early that it's >> there's no Any other com? Yeah, go ahead. >> I was just going to comment the same comments I made for the first one with the PA days and the um I don't know where we landed on the December 23rd half day situation, but same comments apply for that. >> Yeah, I don't believe it's in

209the regulations. I did see this too, Angela. I noticed that too. because it's not necessarily. >> So, I don't remember. >> Why did we do it though this year? Do we know like why did it did it get like proposed to us? >> I think it depended on where it fell. >> I don't know. This year it was a Wednesday, Thursday. Like, >> so it was a Tuesday. The 23rd was a Tuesday. >> Well, I think Sorry. [snorts] No, go. I just, you know, I don't I don't know if I want to necessarily say let's put it as a half day, especially when we're talking about like the chronic absenteeism and maybe it is a full day and we just kind of only make those adjustments >> as recommended by the superended by the superintended.

210>> Um, >> yeah. >> So, is that just an anomaly this year? Have you guys done that before? Did we do it like last year? I can't remember. >> May have done it before. If I can add, I I just remember watching from the audience. I remember Superintendent Greeter saying this is something she could have done by herself, but because the board was all here, let's vote. Let's sort of vote on it. So, I guess that's my followup question. This conversation is >> if uh the superintendent can sort of call a day early dismissal versus a full because it's still a day of school, right? And it counts. So I don't I I don't know if that's we need to answer that or if that's can we can just get through it through regulation versus

211changing the policy to do that or not. >> Yeah because as the super you have the ability to >> have a have a have a >> sure >> close score earlier. >> So >> yep. Um, >> so maybe we just leave it as is and remember you're going to bring both of these back for a second read so it gives me a little bit of time to >> think about it. And I mean the only >> I'm sure everyone would like to have that day as a half day. But my only thought is >> and I you know hear me say this but like whenever it's the last day the day before is always the last day. And so, you know, again, just something to be mindful of as we as we're thinking about the

212impact of partial days and partial weeks. And, you know, >> people who are going to leave on the 23rd for for a trip, let's say, to go visit family or to travel are going to leave on the 23rd most likely, whether it's a half day or not. Again, >> you know, any teachers or students who are home watching are probably like, I thought we liked that guy. Um, [laughter] >> so let me just think about that from an impact p, you know, perspective. >> How often it's only two hours like I don't know. I don't know. Has it been every year? I can't remember. >> I feel like I feel like one year. I I feel like we've had it be a full day. And the only reason I remember this is because I thought

213yes, I can I can wrap all the gifts [laughter] >> without the kids being home because I took the day off, you know? I I don't know. I just That sounds Yeah, >> sure. I just remember. >> Yeah. >> All right. >> Yep. >> Really quick, you know, back when I was in school, it was just a full day. So, we just went through the full day right before Christmas. >> Okay. >> Yeah. I was just I was just saying it's only two hours, right? >> Yeah. >> But at the same time, I can't >> I can't I don't can't remember the reason I'm on. Um, all right. So, >> no, we have to vote now. Yep. We had a motion and a second. So, all those in favor? >> I >> opposed. Extension. Motion

214carries. >> Okay. I lost my agenda. That brings us to uh item nine, consideration of assistant superintendent of finance and operations report. So I need a motion. >> I move to approve the November 2025 financial statement report as presented. >> Second. >> Okay, Dan. >> For sake of time, we're good. >> [laughter] >> Uh we're still we still continue to be on pace. Everything is uh moving along kind of like the budget impact um budget update in there. Um honestly I'm not even sure there's really any you know if if anyone I'm happy to take any questions but I don't think there's really any major anomalies in there to even bring attention to. >> Okay. All those in favor >> I extension. Okay. Motion carries. So that brings us to keep using my agenda. >>

215Yeah, I know it is. Well, I know what item number it is. Um, all right. Item 10, report of the board chair. So, I just want to wish everybody a happy new year. Um, you know, as we begin the new year and the new term, I just want to um wish my fellow board members, our faculty, our staff, our students, and their families really a a healthy, joyful, and successful year ahead. Uh, I wish um I just also want to just thank uh James uh and Angela for their kind words and um thank you to the whole board for electing me chair. I really look forward to continuing uh continued collaboration as we do this important work together um on behalf of our students and our community. Um I also want to extend a very

216warm welcome to Haley and Matt and Matt. Um also welcome again to Jess. Um we're so glad to have you here as the leader of public schools and are really excited see um I have um committee hopefully I got them off but everybody similar um Basically, if you can um prioritize um with the standing committees, prioritize one through four um your interest and then on the liaison um I think there's nine. So, prioritize one through nine. I'll also um send it out electronically so that you can just get it back to me. I'd like to um have them assigned by our next board meeting which is January 26 at Noah Wallace. Um, just so you do know, uh, Beth is on has been on the building committee and she'll continue serving on the building committee

217until that's uh, done. And Erica has been serving on community council for equity and inclusion and there is a meeting this week, January 14th. So I had already uh approached her about whether or not she wants to continue and she will continue on that committee and see I think other than that I mean we received an email from D about an FOIA workshop foyer workshop for public officials at town hall on January 22nd at 6 pm. uh you can go in person or there is also a a virtual link and um D sent out an email about block dates that have to do with um board of ed and town council budget meetings when the public hearing is and the annual town meeting. So just um just be mindful of those uh meetings. Uh the

218board of ed budget is presented to the town council on believe it's March 11th. Um but with that um I hope future meetings will be a little bit shorter. I know past chairs are probably like Andrea you didn't make it before 10. But um I think we uh had a a really good meeting for um a first meeting of this term. Um and especially because we have a lot of new board members. I'm I'm encouraged by um you know the questioning and uh the dialogue that we have tonight and I think we're going to do a lot of good work going forward. So with that said, can I have a motion to adjurnn? >> I move to adjurnn. All those in favor? >> I >> Okay, >> we're adjourned at 10:46. [music]