001All >> [music] >> right. Good evening everybody. I want to welcome you to the October 6, 2025 regular board of education meeting. It is 6:00 p.m. on the dot. Um, can we all stand please for the pledge of allegiance? Would you lead us, please? >> I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you. >> All right. Call the role. >> Yes, ma'am. President Marina >> here. >> Vice President Bay Area >> here. >> Secretary Anthony Kane of the city >> here. >> Mr. Anthony King >> here. >> Miss Amy Parker >> here. >> Miss John >> here. >> Miss Amy Broski >> here. >> Mr. Jose Rivera >> here. >>
002And Miss Tim right here. >> All righty. Thank you ma'am. Um moment of meditation. I don't know if anyone has any intentions. They go to >> uh um Hazmi Kortin Canada. >> Thank you. Take a moment. Oops. Thank you. All right. Public participation. We've got two folks on our list and going to Hold on one second. We've got um I've got Francina Sloan. >> Yep. You come right up to the podium and address the board. Um you've got three minutes. So, I'm going to put on the timer on my handy dandy phone here. So, when it goes off, >> yeah, >> is it? >> Go right ahead. >> Okay. So, I'm not quite sure what this meeting was about. I thought it was going to be about the transportation issue as well in this district
003because it is my understanding that according to the state, children need to leave live at least 2 miles away from the school to qualify for a bus. But any of you that live 2 miles away from work wouldn't get up and walk to work every morning. And I don't know why we're requiring that of our children. My granddaughter lives 1.9 miles. She lives a tenth of a mile away from the high school. It takes almost an hour. They have to be to school at 7:30 in the morning, which means that she has to leave at 6:30. It's dark. It's about to be winter. It's about to be cold. It'll be rain. It'll be whatever. And then she's expected to get to school after doing that, walking for the better part of an hour and be
004ready to learn. She's walked through rain. She's walked in the cold. And and on top of that, it is it's like I said, it's going to be dark. She's not originally from here. She's from Brooklyn, New York. So, she's not even really familiar with New Britain like that. Number one. Number two, she's a little 13year-old. We know we have a child sex trafficking problem. Who wants their 13-year-old child walking alone to school in the morning at 6:30? Because they look for patterns and if they see her every morning, somebody it can be related. I'm this is just a hypothetical drama, but it it shouldn't have to be that. It should it should just be about why does she have to walk almost 2 miles to school and then be ready to learn. None of us.
005If you would live 15 minutes away from school and or from your job and it was pouring raining and you had the option to get in your car, you would get in your car. Why are we requiring our children to do that? They I heard it was a budgetary thing. Why is the owners of a short budget fall to the children? She can't. There's no one to take her. My daughter will get up in a minute and tell you she's been spending $30 on the hard mornings for Uber. Some mornings it's $5, some mornings it's $30, and she still gets there late because it's a Uber. I I'm not understanding. I talked to the guy last week from First Student and I asked him, "If the bus passes by, are are you opposed to it
006stopping and picking her up?" Because buses pass by. I'm I'm just it's beyond my comprehension why we would we would why we would require children to walk almost 2 miles when not anybody in this room walks 2 miles to work. We It's our it's it's the duty of us to make sure our children get an education. Why would she why would what kind of education is she going to get is the first thing in the morning she has to go into the bitter cold and then when she gets there her teacher feels like she has an attitude. I would have an attitude. Dude, I have an attitude when I got to go across the street for 15 minutes and I had put my pajamas on. So, I'm going to take my pajamas off and go.
007I have an attitude. Why would Why? So, it makes no sense. Somebody needs to figure it out before you know winter is coming. Anybody watch uh White Walkers will be out. Is my 3 minutes out? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Thank you and good night. >> Thank you. >> Sorry guys. Sorry, that was my mom. >> Um, she basically said everything I was about to say, but yes, I am the parent that is spending about $30, maybe three times a week for my daughter to get to school, which is absolutely crazy cuz that is not reimbured. Yes, she's getting to school late majority of the time. I have to write a note every single morning to excuse tardiness because we're waiting for a Uber. It's this is not like a super busy area. Ubers sometimes take
00810, 15 minutes before they get to me for her to get to school. She got to be to school at 7:30. She's not getting to school till 7:45, 8:00. That's taken away from half the class time, half her education, half of her learning. And it's it's starting to trickle down like slowly but to her grades because yes, she is aggravated in the morning because I'm aggravated cuz I'm like, "Hurry up. Let's go." She don't want to hear that. I don't want to do that every morning. it. Um, yeah, the one the two miles and the 1.9 her walking an hour to school is a little bit ridiculous. They're saying, "Oh, let her walk with a group of friends." Oh, her group of friends don't live near here. So, she is going to be walking by
009herself. Yeah, she might see someone walking that is going in that same direction. She doesn't know them. She's not going to just technically they're a stranger to her. It's a little bit of an inconvenience for the parents and definitely for the kids. I don't know what happened with the budget or how it but like my mom said for it to kind of be affect the kids be affected by it is it's not okay. So I I don't know what we're doing but we do need to figure something out. >> Thank you. >> All right. Those were the only two individuals on the list. Is there anyone else that wishes to comment or speak to the board? >> Go once. >> Can I speak again? >> No. [laughter] >> Okay. And a third time. >> All
010right. Thank you. Then public participation is over. Moving on to our agenda. Sir, superintendent report. Good evening everyone. Thank you all for being here. First, I'd like to welcome our two newest members of the board, our two students. We'll have them introduce themselves in a moment when it's your turn to speak, but thank you for being here. Thank you for volunteering your time. Um, as always, we like to begin with our district dispatch, which the board members have in front of you. Um, of course I'm biased. I think it's always excellent, but I think this is actually one of our best editions yet. Thank you to Miss Langanger and the whole team at communications. Just to give you some of the highlights here, the cover, the first page, and the the big article inside. Really
011nice result for our marching band at the high school, winning first place at the Royal Blues Band Show in Rocky Hill. A wonderful showing by them. Uh page one uh is the superintendent's message of building the beacon. Just letting parents know that we continue to roll out that communication platform that we're very excited about. It's got a lot of letters, seven letters. CSPVPN. Um, we continue to roll that out. Training and more uh information sharing is yet to come. Um, then following up on pages two and three, that really nice article about the marching bands triumph. Want to just point out the credit at the bottom of the right hand page. These wonderful pictures are from a student uh student Akira Gunowan submitted these photos. really great job of a really great uh victory by
012out marching band. Uh next we have the update that you'll be hearing more from Miss Velasquez in a little bit. Um the board's curriculum committee has had a presentation about the the standardsbased report cards. We are featuring it here as we continue to do lots of communication there. I did want to also report that I think I've mentioned this in a board update in my Friday email. um Miss Velasquez, other members of the team um will be holding three separate community forums where the team can come together with parents about not just the report card, but also how to support students achievement and how the students uh parents and staff can can better partner [clears throat] with student success. I'm sure Miss Velasquez will feature it, but those are coming up on October 22nd, November
0135th, and November 19th. The October 22nd edition is at Ozgood Park at the building there. November 5th will be at OIC and November 19th will be at the Boys and Girls Club. So really thankful to Miss Velasquez and her team for that outreach. More explanation follows and then a really nice article about one of our newest or our newest um school secretary uh Jana Willis is featured on pages 8 and N. And I will say I was uh at Gaffne school for two days last week or during two days last week and witnessed for myself just how well Jana knows the kids, knows the parents and knows the staff there. So, uh there was a a situation that we needed the assistance. We needed all hands on deck and and Jana was a big part
014of helping that situation go as well as possible. We always like to feature our superintendent's challenge coins with uh Cassandra, Valerie, and Tara being recognized for for various reasons. All three of those ladies really contributing meaningfully to the school district. Um then the typical kind of wrap-up of some of our better uh social media posts from the past month or so. I do want to wrap up just by saying uh one more thank you to the staff and the and the parents most especially and of course the kids who have been so patient with our opening few weeks with our transportation issues issues, excuse me. They continue to get marginally better day by day, right? No no lightning bolts, no um no voice from the heavens saying that everything will now be better, but it
015does continue to get better little by little. um with lots of other information to come from Mel Velasquez in a moment. That would be my update for tonight. >> Thank you, sir. Appreciate it. All right. Committee reports. We did have committee meetings. So, I'll start, Miss Reyes, with policy. >> Sure. Um so, we had a number of items that we looked at. There were a few that were tabled for some um additional research. There's three items on the regular agenda and two on consent that we'll be looking at tonight. Thank you, Mr. Payne. On finance, >> we had a meeting. >> Yeah, we had a meeting. >> Um, in addition to quite a few items on the agenda tonight where uh various um purchases and donations, we the superintendent referred to the various issues that
016we've had with our transportation vendor. So, um, at my request, I asked the superintendent and to invite a representative from first student to come and address the board so that we could hear from their side because we've all received phone calls from constituents, parents, and media about what's going on with the bus transportation. So, we asked them to hear their side. They gave their little presentation and we addressed our concerns and I I spoke my mind. We all pretty much gave our opinion and I think it was bullying me cell that they have a lot of work to do. I know that Dr. Gasper has been addressing it with them. I know he's taken recourse with them. They are working very hard and it sounds like what he said that changes have been made and
017we'll take it from there. >> Okay. Thank you, sir. Miss Parker from personnel. >> We had a short meeting >> in comparison to Mr. Kane's meeting. Yes. [laughter] And we had a coupleus and a couple of new positions and one table item and newus and the um new positions are on the consent agenda for tonight. That was it. >> Thank you. And Mr. King for curriculum. >> Um we had a another brief meeting uh for curriculum. Um, we just got an update on uh flex rooms um for special education um based on a state grant that we received and there are nine uh believe flex rooms across six six I'm sorry, six flex rooms across the district currently. Um and that presentation um can be viewed online. Um it wasn't part of our meeting this
018last month, but the uh standardsbased report cards came back from an earlier meeting last spring. All right. Thank you everybody. Uh board reports. >> Yes, sir. >> Um I forgot to mention my committee report. We had a great presentation from Jeff Pro about the new and you mentioned your report the CSD uh pronounc DM. >> Yeah, DM the app. Um and after a meeting uh Jeff showed me and it's a great system. Um, one of the frustrations I've had as a board liaison is trying to track down what's going out at my schools. Um, talking to the principles, they'll say, "Go to Facebook or they'll email me." And he showed me I could zero in on a school. Well, one of my schools is New Brin High. And what's been frustrating is I get calls
019from parents, they want to know what's going on. They don't get notified. you know, uh, and one of the things that really frustrated them last week was that they're finding out the day before there were events going on, um, last Thursday night was the there was a financial aid night. There was parent teacher conferences. My own school was playing a volleyball game against Red High. Everybody found out about this one night. They had they then they had one night to rearrange parents schedules, who's going to go where, um, parking. It was crazy. And I went to go visit to watch my students play. And I had parents scrambling, where do I go for this? Nobody knew. So I pulled out the app and of course none of those events were on the app. >> The
020only communication was some social media. And some parents I asked, "How have you found out of it?" all my child told me or I got tech very little communication. So it was very frustrating but here we talk about all these communication device ways and we still have to do better. Um I mean parents are man the parking lot was packed. We had all these events going on at the high school and we want to talk about we want to get parents engaged and I think we make it a goal of this administration to get more parents engaged. If we use the tools that we have, how could we get if we use these tools this year, we could have got more parents engaged at night? Um really give maybe a week to two weeks notice
021of cases, some of these parents, not one day. >> Anybody else? >> Yes, ma'am. >> So, I have a question before I go to my comments here. So, where are the dates you read out? This will last, have those already been communicated or will they be communicated? Reading this um Ryan later, the dates for the community forums. >> Yeah, I can pull them up. >> No, I have them. >> We know them. >> Have they already been communicated or will they be soon? >> The date was changed on Friday and the communication materials have been updated. So, they should be going up this week. Can we change the date to not interfere with Hispanic heritage at the high school? >> Thanks. paper you have. >> You want my sticky note? >> I just want you
022to read the sticky note. >> I said I said them twice. I'll say them one more time. >> Yes, I can send them. >> No, >> they got them. >> They'll they'll get them when when we communicate soon. October 22nd >> at Osgood Park. >> Osgood Park. >> November 5th at OIC. November 19th at Boys and Girls. And all of those begin at 5:30 p.m. I believe. Correct. Velasquez. >> Yes. Do I have to bring my own coffee? >> Then um heads up to all parents. We're This is trunk or treat season. Get ready. Get ready. Get ready. Get ready. Get ready with your costumes. Whatever you need to do. It is trunk or treat season. So connect with an elementary school. Make sure that you're giving outward passing around. I've never said no to
023somebody coming around a second time. Don't look for me. Just saying. I've never said no if you found me giving out candy to giving, you know, larger size to parents because I'm sorry, we do need it. The other thing was I am last and final. Um, thank you for every every community event that's been happening over the weekend, stuff going on at the library, which everybody should be paying attention to because that's important, too. Um, which we really have been able to do. Some exciting stuff for anybody that's enrolled in Catechism at St. Mary's. Proud of you. Um, last and final, I am one of those parents that did not get a heads up on parent teacher conferences until the afternoon, >> which drove me absolutely nuts because I have four kids in the district,
024three of them, one of them in climb and two of them in pathways. It is in my IEP that we have regular communication. So I make sure in my child's IEP rather so we communicate but that was not mentioned in the more recent Tuesday update because it was assumed that there had been another communicate. The other communication that had come out was an email and I made sure I took a look at it. I even wrote back. We had conversation. It was great. There was nothing written in there about parent teacher conferences. And for anybody that knows, when you are a parent in the district, you owe it to your district to be involved. That was tough. >> Running late. I was able to catch up with um Michelle Abraham, who was my coach at
025New Britain High School in volleyball. Thank God for that. And I was able to catch up with both of the teachers in the um Pathways program, which took me a little bit out of the way from everything else that I wanted to do, which was celebrate our parents being there. And there weren't that many parents. It was mostly students. We're trying, but we got to get better at that because I want the parents there, not just the students, but I did run into a couple parents that I was [clears throat] and staff that I was able to catch up with, which was really good. >> Like I said, I saw parents I saw running up in the parking lot were running and I asked them when they find out and most their feeling was day
026or the day before. >> I was showing the text, anybody now, it's 38 on this thing. Um and so and then um if I can I just want to say that that was it was important for me to have that face-toface time. I encourage the students and the parents to make sure that they're having that time apart from classroom time to actually just speak to your teachers. They're there. They're human. They want to be able to talk to you. It was great having a conversation with um with the Pathways team. Um that was it. I can communicate on the email whenever I get it for the other thing. So, thank you. >> Hi, Amy. Hi. >> Um, I attended the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education webinar on new board members as the newest board
027member. Um, and I learned a few important things in terms of expectation setting. Um, the first is that as sole individuals, we cannot do a lot, right? parents will approach us one by one to talk about um problems. Um it is not our job to solve it there but to help um people u understand how to communicate problems to the higher ups and also to work as a board as an entire board. We are powerful together. So you probably knew that [laughter] to do but the other thing is that it's not just parents and community but our legislators um and we were reminded that it is everybody's right by the state constitution to have high quality public education and so by that I felt like we were given license to work with our state legislators.
028I've been asking for money for the board of education for 17 years and feeling a little shy about it. I'm [laughter] not going to be shy. >> You go girl >> with our elected leaders also. Um so that's something that's going to be on my radar for the next school year. >> Looking forward to it. >> I would like I would like to say um first of all congratulations to the freshman team. Um my son is the starting center, so they had an amazing game um in field. Yes. Um they're doing good. I went to that game. There was a couple of uh parents that were a little, you know, rough, but um it was didn't get out of hand. But um also, I'm happy about the events. I did get a few complaints about
029the um parent night at the high school, but um like Amy pointed out, I you know, directed them to write to the to Dr. Gasper and any teacher they had to communicate that to. Um but yeah, definitely it was a little troublesome. Myself, we had to split because there was a few events and I had to be at one. Um but I am always telling Dr. guys spur that even with these shortfalls or shortcomings. The staff always picks up the pace and I'm hopeful that they'll get on point with that as well. You know, I I know things happen is early on the bus situation. Let's blame it on that as well. Um you know, it throw throw us off, right? But I'm expecting it to get better, you know. Thank you. >> Yes, sir.
030>> Um Jose kind of reminded me of another one. This one came from not high school but my own students at Weaver. They were um as we were talking about Thursday, they were telling me about how pleased they were helping at the game. One of my students came up and said how excited they were to hear that the Grand High volleyball coach is going to be inducted into the volleyball hall of fame. >> Yeah. >> Really? And so I looked it up and verified that and like wow you went to the volleyball hall of fame and told me about her record and like I'm proud to hear that and I was like we should bring her to a board meeting congratulating her >> or you can go visit her at Brookside >> also Mr. Richardson
031was also named recently honored recently a very nice honor. >> Yes sir. Um, I do want to point out, not to I don't know if you were going to mention it, but in case she doesn't, Sophia is a member of the marching band. She's a payment, so she's part of that win um a week week ago, Saturday. >> Um, and then they followed it up with a great performance in Enfield. Um, and after, um, there was some booing from the Enfield sideline, our team proceeded to outscore Enfield, I think 32 to nothing in the second half. So we got some a little group afterwards. [laughter] The football team backed up the band. So um no, so both both the uh football team and marching weather are doing phenomenally. So congrats to that. Um and uh
032just on the on the topic of um the high school the um uh there was a large turnout as several of the members had mentioned um on the night of uh conferences which included conferences uh FAFSA night and the volleyball game. Um I didn't know about conferences or receive any notification till that morning about 7:30 I think the email and phone call came through. Um so and I know you know in the past we've gotten uh notifications for uh open house. I guess there wasn't an open house this year. Um but just looking through my phone and my emails I think the last time I had received communication from the high school in regards to any scheduling or anything was August the end of August. So if we could just maybe have a little more
033communication on a regular basis full of newsletters or you know maybe a week ahead or something just to make plans. Um I know you know we all try to involve ourselves as much as possible but um a lot of people are smart then so >> all right the only thing I've got is big game against Southernington Friday >> alumni night. Hello >> be there classes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's our 30th. >> Oh, it's your >> It's our 30th. So, we have to be >> Well, then we have to go. [laughter] >> You got to go support us. >> I know. We We've come back >> or like us Diana and I have not left. [laughter] >> All right. So, now we have student reports. Welcome. And so, just anything you guys want to share with
034us and first about introduce yourselves and you want to go first. >> Yeah. Um my name is Sophia. I'm a senior at Newurn High School. Hi, I'm Ella. I'm a senior at New Britain High. And I also want to talk about the communication because throughout my years at New Britain High, nothing's communicated to the students. Nothing's communicated to the parents. And honestly, sometimes it's not even communicated to the teachers. So, I think we definitely do need to reach out to admin and figure out what's going on and trying to see if we can get more of a schedule like, okay, this is coming up. Let's reach out to teachers, parents, everybody cuz it's not just like yes, parent teacher night that was also on the teachers, but there's other things that are not being communicated
035to teachers that should be communicated and that's just part of it. >> Yeah. I mean, I would like to add to that. I know you guys have mentioned it already, but that parent night, I think there could have been a lot more communication um to parents. I think parent inclusion is really important. You know, in order to have success within students, parents should be involved whether it's good or bad, you know, like I think that if a student is doing well, like they should receive credit for that because that goes a long way and that keeps us, you know, students motivated to continue doing well. But also if a student isn't doing as well and you know they're kind of having a hard time in school, I think you know letting the parents know what's
036happening with their student could help them a lot more than maybe like possibly staff. So I feel like there should be a much broader sense of communication with that. And I think you know I know an email was sent out to parents because my parents um did know about it but I think that you know parents are busy people and not always can check their emails. So I think sending that out maybe through social medias or other active platforms in which parents can probably see it more often would be a lot more helpful and would probably benefit to the student success. >> Okay. Thanks. Anything going on at the school that you ladies would like us to know about >> besides Friday that you're going to see agenda. Um, so I heard from a couple
037people about a new policy and I like this is through the grape vine, so I'm not sure about all the things being correct, but I heard that um there was a new policy that if you were to fail like let's say a core class in your one of your semesters, you would have to restart the whole year or like you would still be considered 9th grade, 10th grade, whatever you failed in that semester and you wouldn't just be able to make it up next year. And I just wanted to express >> Can I ask you to say that again, please? Because I don't want something to go on the public record if it's not >> that's I just heard it through the grapevine that there >> as you describe it. It does not sound accurate.
038So So what I'd love to do is meet with you with you both. I'll come to the high school. >> Okay. >> Right. And we'll make sure that we've got the >> That's just what I heard from a couple people. So I don't I don't know if it's true. >> And we want to be really careful about when we're at a public board meeting that we only say what we know is true. If it's true, then we'll talk about it. >> Okay? So, we'll talk about that later. And then I also like this might be high school specific, but we have a bathroom issue. >> And I speak for me personally, I am unable to use the bathroom sometimes because even with the monitors outside of the bathroom, kids are still skipping in the bathroom
039and they're not being checked and we're not handling it appropriately. And it's affecting a lot of the students that actually want to go to the bathroom and learn. Like I was in the bathroom the other day for like waiting in line for 30 minutes. And I don't think that's okay for our health and for our learning. That's it. >> Interesting. Sounds like you have a good >> I probably say the same thing too. I feel like um bathroom of all things shouldn't necessarily be something that should be taken away from student education. I think that waiting in line at least 30 minutes for the bathroom given our class periods are definitely elongated. I'm grateful that, you know, they're 90 minutes, but that is a huge chunk of learning that you're missing out on just to
040use the bathroom. And while I do appreciate the monitoring because of course it's there for safety precautions and to make sure and ensure that all students can use the bathrooms appropriately, as in the day I think it's not really as effective and I think the cons heavily outweigh the pros of having monitors at Yes. >> Interesting. >> Thank you ladies. Appreciate it. Welcome to the board. >> Thank you. >> All right. So moving on on to the next um we've got a couple executive sessions here. So, I'll entertain a motion to go into executive session to to uh with >> attorney Eric Bartlett, Dr. Gasper, Dr. Sanders. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I. >> All right. We are in executive session. >> We're back from executive session and I will entertain a
041motion to go back into executive session to discuss, >> okay, and include Dr. Sanders and Dr. Gasper and Attorney Ritter >> and and also Mary Ellen >> and Mary Ellen. Sorry, I think so. >> Is Mary Ellen with us? >> Is Mary Ellen here? >> Oh, there she is. And Manning. All those in favor? >> Any opposed? >> We're in executive session again. >> All right, we are back from executive session. >> I've got 150 kids every day. All right. I will entertain a motion to approve >> second [laughter] >> a motion to approve the collective bargaining agreement between CSD&B and the New Britain Federation of PAR educators local 2407. Thank you very much for motion and a second. All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Motion carries. All right. [cheering] >>
042That's it. That's it. >> Yay. >> Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. >> All right. So, coming up next, sir, we have a presentation K through five standardsbased report cards update. >> Yes, we have Miss Velasquez with us tonight and a lot of documents and communications that have been shared and will continue to be shared. As uh Mr. Kane said earlier, this was an update that went to the curriculum committee, I believe, two meetings ago perhaps. Yeah. >> And because this is something that impacts every child, every teacher, every family in kindergarten through five, we really are treating it as quite a big deal. So, Miss Velasquez is here tonight just to give us a further update on how it's going >> and uh the ways in which this is being communicated and
043shared with the trans. >> So, we've been hard at work. I know that we've been here uh several times to talk about the report cards, but we wanted to give you an update because there was a flurry of activity at the beginning of the year to get the word out. And so what is going around there are a two-pager that we're trying to get to as many places as possible. You'll see that it's um in three languages. We have also put out a video that you might have seen featuring muah and um putting out again putting out in um social media. We have uh the communications office has been amazing putting things out for us. These posters are in three different languages [cough] and [clears throat] they were all over the schools right before open
044house so that parents when they go to the schools they could see that. Um and then um and then we academic team um I've got to say Chrissy Bordello um um uh Lily and Amy and um uh Dr. Dr. Mario Molina, all of that team has now taken up the charge to make sure that it's a year-long conversation. And this is important to us because we believe that making sure the kids have access to rigorous instruction that standards based is so important. Um, so the report card, changing the report card just is one other lever to use to make sure that that's happening. But, you know, just making it so, just changing the report cards isn't the end of it, right? Um, you know, I I think um I think Christy and Lily Lily Stewart
045in particular was was talking to me about, you know, this is this is really a year-long thing, right? next week, um they're going to take advantage of that half day PD to help teachers really talk about what do the words mean and how do we um collect evidence to make sure that when the parent gets this report card, I believe it's um early December, um that it is actually going to do what we want it to do, which is communicate exactly what the kids are doing, where where they're doing well, and really highlight here are the places we need to partner to to really help them out. So, we we think it's a a a big effort. It's going to take all year, but really well worth it. Um, what else can I say? So,
046openhouse, videos, posters, >> the community forums. >> Yes. So the three community forums aren't going So the community forums we we want it to be a broader issue about how to support your child in school, not just about the report card, but of course at the um one that I believe is the Boys and Girls Club is going to be highlighting the report card especially. So um more more to come on that as we roll those things out. Do you guys have any questions for us? >> Go ahead. Um he is always teasing me about I'm always saying Harford or Harford. We recently switched over to a standard base as well and their plan is so complex that myself as a doctor in training I don't even understand it. Your plan from what I've seen
047so far is so simple to understand. I am amazed how easy it is to understand. He's looking it over. Yeah, it's four simple steps. It tells exactly what it is. Clear. The only question I would have I would love more information of how teachers would arrive at what is a three, what is a four from the teachers end of it. That's the only question I would have if you give me that information. I would love to see it. But it's very easy to understand. It's so much better than the complex. I think Harford maybe we have like six or seven different st levels and different you know we actually have two different versions of app and yours is so much easier. It really does show what a standard is. Are they doing it or they
048not? [clears throat] Uh well, I will tell you this is a lot on the communication folks, right? We have some non-educators that we had to explain what we did and then they had to create these documents and they did a fabulous job of making it as simple as possible. I know we um satisfied Dr. Gasper's keep it simple, right? Um, but the truth is that behind the scenes, right, it does it is going to be more complicated for the teachers and we're offering that support and that's stuff that is going to make it go well if we do it each teacher feels supported and and that's the PD that we're going to be doing all year. >> Somebody will ask us perhaps on the teacher side to to Mr. Kane's question from the teacher side,
049what is a one, what is a two, a three, and a four? >> Yeah. So, um, the [clears throat] language that you have there will be applied across the standards. Next time we do an update, we're going to bring you what the report cards look like so you can see actually the task of putting these 1, two, three, four on the standards report card, right? And so for each lang, you know, each sentence, which again, we tried to make it so that it wasn't all teacher jargon that it was comprehensible by parents. Um, they will be putting these one, two, three, and four. Right now, what they have to decide and they're going into PD in um No, we no Wednesday. Wednesday. It's Wednesday. Um so on Wednesday, what they will be doing is learning
050about how to sit together. So let's say I I'm on a team and I teach third grade and I got two other people, right? We're going to sit down and decide what are the pieces of evidence that we're going to collect in order to grade that standard. Okay? So all that work is still happening right now. I think those are great conversations, right? It's it's it makes for more collaboration amongst team members. Um so that when they sit down in front of parents, they will have evidence, right? Hopefully what'll happen is also let's [clears throat] say it's the reading standard. I can take out a book and show parent this is where they were at the beginning of the year, this is where they are now, right? And and look, they they got a two
051because they're making really good progress. >> Yeah. Does that answer your question? >> Caution. I remember when um Dr. Cooper years ago tried to switch over something similar and sitting in a parent teacher conference with um said the second grade teacher and my son was getting he was getting 90s and 95s on every single assessment but when he got his report card he was a C which equivalent here would be a two >> right? So >> because the teacher said well he's a well he's average >> because that's what he's averaging out. All the kids in our class are averaging that. >> so I think I think that's a really important point if I may. >> Go ahead. >> That a C does not convert to a two. >> Yes. Exactly. >> Right. A two
052mean So there's you know and I I'm sometimes I'm guilty of talking in too many analogies but there's a there's a a slope. >> Yeah. There's a slope and and that's what our our slogan is this year, right? Grade level thinking 180 days a year. We know that if a kid is going to be if the child arrives in third grade on grade level, in order to get them to leave third grade still on grade level, they need to do grade level thinking every single day of the year. And for me, that's what a two is. It means that Tony the student is showing progress that we think is going to end up with him being proficient by the end of the year on this particular standard. So, it's going to be a hard habit
053for everybody to break, teachers, families, and kids to break to say, "Oh, a two that's like a C, right?" No, a two means you are progressing. That we think you're on the right slope. >> And that's what we try to explain to the teacher. Yeah. The teacher didn't understand the new grading system. So, we're doing a ton of work. We know there will be mixups. We know there'll be a small number of teachers who, you know, don't quite have it yet. Uh we we know that nothing goes per nothing this complex goes perfectly the first time you implement it. But, as Miss Velasquez said, I'm thankful to her and the team that she mentioned earlier um for what they're putting into this. And then that work translates into every school principal and assistant principal at
054the K5 level and the teachers and the leaders and the coaches. So this is why we've brought this back to you so many times and it'll come back again in the future because it's not quote just a report card. It's really about better communicating to kids and parents, but also as Miss Velasquez said, it's about communicating to every single teacher or hopefully reminding every single teacher what really is important and those it's not for every standard that that are in the standards matrix. It's their colleagues about 30 of their colleagues if I remember correctly. Yes, the committee was >> about 30 of their colleagues got together and said, "We think these are the most critical standards for grade three, for grade four, etc." So, it's a big deal. We know it's not going to be
055perfect. It's easy for your superintendent to predict that you're going to get some phone calls from your constituents saying, "What the heck is this?" >> And some people will even say, "I never even heard of this." Even no matter no matter how many times we send it out or put it on social media. >> Um, but we will continue pushing. We will have these forums. Um, I'm really excited about it. I think it's a big step forward for how we do business on behalf of the children of the city. Um, but it's going to be a work in progress and after our first year of implementing it, we may find some standards need to come and some standards need to go. >> I I just had one question. I because I got asked before about
056other notifications in Polish. So, I don't know if if there's >> need or not, but I know I know >> I I I was asked about something else not that long ago, Ryan, and I I know I sent it to you about um creating that in Polish. It wasn't this, but it was notification. >> We don't have the the staff like we do for Arabic or for uh Spanish, but Mr. to proc or Miss Linger can talk about the new communication tools and their ability to translate >> translate. Right. >> So our new tools when we put it into the message creator translates into every one of our districts languages that parents have put place preferred on their power school page. Um and we've been working with administrators on on an ongoing basis to make
057sure don't attach PDFs to your email because they won't translate. Put all the information in the update. So while our documents that are attached as re extra resources are in the languages that we have staff that can make the documents in those other families will still get the information that they need to know in their native language. It's just not as nice of a package always. >> Okay. I just want to make sure that we don't exclude it because this is going to be something critical for >> any of those parents to understand and come to the end. I think when I asked before about languages, it sounded like they were more Ukrainian right now than Polish. >> And the community forum materials actually have been put into Ukrainian that are going out. We work
058with staff member who's not in the communications office who speaks Ukrainian to support that support those families. >> Thank you. All righty. Moving on to new business. Uh, can I have a motion to approve minutes from regular board meeting of September 2nd? >> Okay. Any discussion, changes? Anything? All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Okay. um report on personnel transactions and extracurricular appointments. >> Motion to approve. >> Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? >> Any opposed? >> All right. Enrollment report. Yes, as usual, you have that before you and um you can see we really don't vary much these days. We're kind of up and down right around flat around uh 96 to 9,800 students. Um the high school has ticked just below 2,500, but not by much. >> Okay. I don't
059believe there's anything to approve there. That's >> information. >> Okay. Item D, motion to review and approve new board policy 5131-911, school climate. >> Second, any questions, comments, concerns? >> This came before the policy committee and there was a I would say just a formatting error. Some things were included and not exactly in the right order. want to say thank you to Miss Soler and also Mr. Richardson um with whom I met. I believe this is now ready for board adoption. >> Yes. >> Okay. All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? >> All right. Approved. Uh motion to review and approve bylaws of board of education the consolidated school district. This is an updated uh the bylaws were updated to include um and expand on the role of board members as school liaison.
060>> So move second. >> Any questions? Yes, ma'am. I don't have it in front of me, but it was on page 102 of our packet. It was section three vacancy and then a B and it seemed like there was a sentence missing. So >> I don't have the >> I can copy and paste it after the >> It just seems like a >> Oh yeah. >> Okay. That's interesting. >> Miss Edwards, do you see that? >> We can talk tomorrow. It's near the bottom under section section 3B. Probably just a formatting error. >> I think so. >> So, Madam President, I think you can choose to approve as amended. >> As amended. Yes. Okay. Thanks, Amy. Any other questions, comments, concerns? All those in favor? >> Any opposed? All righty. Motion to review and approve
061policy 90010, limits of authority. And there was just a minor change there in concert with adding the school leaison rules. >> Second. >> Any questions? All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Okay. So, getting to the consent agenda. Anybody want to remove any items from the consent agenda? >> I'd like to remove items Q W, please. >> All right. Can I have a motion to remove items Q through W from the consent agenda? >> Move to remove >> second. >> All those in favor? >> Any opposed? All right. So in addressing now items Q through W >> to accept items Q through W. >> Second. >> Any questions? Comments concerns. >> All those in favor? >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? >> I. >> Okay. Going back to the consent agenda minus items Q
062through W >> to accept. >> Second. >> Any questions, comments, concerns? >> All those in favor? >> Any opposed? All right. Motion carries. Um, all right. as far as any other business permitted by law. Um, one of the things that I did want to bring up with folks um has to do with we've got a number of things um items that I know we keep battering around going, "Oh, we got to get to that or oh, we got to get to this." Um, three of those things that I have in my mind is the discussion of facilities and programming for the district. Um the next would be the district growth plan as I know it expires so to speak on June 30th. And then also your goals beginning July [clears throat] 1st of next year
063because they will expire and these while they seem the latter two seem way down the road um as we start looking at the calendars and things and people's availability. Um, so I wanted to have bring that up number one. Number two, and then as far as discuss with board, um, thoughts as far as what to tackle first and when. Um, like we know elections are coming up after our next board meeting. The board may look different. Um, so potentially holding off discussions about buildings and facilities and programming to a meeting in November so that we can start looking at our calendars and putting that together. Maybe that that off Monday that we have. Well, no, we can't do that. We can't do the off Monday because we're not all sworn in yet. >> Whoever we
064may be, whoever we may be. Um and that's another meeting we have to schedule is our annual meeting >> right >> either right after elections so that >> your bylaws say that Wednesday or the day after sworn in >> right generally election day is the 4th the uh 11th >> will be the 11th >> that's Veterans Day are they still going to do it that day um the 11th so anywhere the 12th 13th or 14th Um, we will need to meet whomever we'll need to meet. >> I have to be careful with my language. Um, whomever will need to meet in order to then hold our annual meeting and elect officers. So, um, if folks could get back to me for 12th, 13th, and 14th availability, which works better, please let me know. Um, >>
065so then as far as the other meetings I was talking about, I'm I'm not sure what folks thoughts are about scheduling meetings to discuss those items. >> As much as I'd like to get some of those items discussed, I honestly don't want to feel like tying the next board up in up in some of those topics. I would like to get the facilities started. I would like to get really like to get his goals started. I know that that's to me the most important one is superintendent's goals, but I also feel guilty. I mean, I'm hoping I'm here. [laughter] >> But I would feel bad ting up the next board something a decision I made to not be here. So my my recommendation for the board's consideration is the facilities discussion is substantial >> and
066and it's almost a misnomer in my opinion to call it a facilities discussion. Right? I believe you should be envisioning what are the educational programs that you want >> the children of of new of New Britain to experience for the next 10 years. then um whether we have the in-house expertise or we need outside expertise to say do you have the buildings to make your vision come true. >> Mhm. >> Okay, >> that's fair. Y >> um so and as you know in my kind of nerdy way I find that to be quite fun and rewarding such discussions. So I'm looking forward to it. I don't mean to sound as though I'm dissuading you from having them quite the opposite but it's very very important. Mhm. >> Well, and I, as I said, I do
067know if we're talking the 12th or the 14th to have the annual meeting, depending on who's here, that um that following week, the 17th through the 21st, I don't know if there's availability for folks if we want to schedule discussion for the educational programs. It's not that we're going to solve war and peace or anything, but just kick that off. >> What I think, Madam President, you and I can can discuss is that a discussion that warrants um an outside facilitator, sometimes those discussions go better when a third party such as Dave Irwin that we used for the board strategic goals, >> okay, >> um who can kind of help the board break through. Otherwise, it it's very easy for those topics to or those kind kinds of discussions to focus on the current rather
068than the future. Especially if um you know you've experienced this school district for yourself. It's human nature to kind of envision the school district as you have known it versus >> how it could or should be um for the next 10 years. And that really involves really big conversations about >> what types of schools we want the kids of the city to attend. >> Yep. >> Totally agree. All right. So then you and I can >> we can we can brainstorm if that's a conversation that you'd like a third party to facilitate and and um I'll have >> if so I'll have a name or two that I could recommend. >> Okay. Um I know too previously we kind of had a little retreaty kind of thing for ourselves and possibly after um >> is
069over. I thought it was really really a good we used um not dance. What did we use? I said smallie, right? We were at Smally and just chilling with some >> That was in my first summer here, Miss That was three years ago. >> And you brought coffee and I was just like, "Wow." >> And then we did then we did one on the fourth floor here. >> Yep. >> Yes. >> Yeah. But the one where you brought coffee was much better. >> Pretty sure I provided coffee to both >> till all of them, right? Yeah, >> you did. >> I know how things work. Yeah. [laughter] >> Okay. Any thoughts on his questions? Dr. Gasper and I could talk about the educational programming piece as far as mapping out other sessions. I I we
070do need to again start looking at your goals. I don't want to short change it because May will come around real quick and June >> um before we know it. And so that'll be something that I think will definitely need to get tackled. And we may be talking January, but I want to I want to get it out there >> so that people have that on their radar and that we can try to get some ideas of when. >> All right. So for the short term, if you guys could let me know availability between the 12th and the 14th so that we can the the annual meeting can be held to move on. >> All right. >> Okay. Any other business as permitted by law? >> I'll entertain a motion to adjurnn. >> All those
071in favor? >> Took a while. I thought people would be jumping on. >> Have a good night everyone. Thank you. >> [music]