Amity Board of Education Meeting - June 14, 2021

001um okay time at 6 33 i'd like to welcome you all and uh this is the monday june 14th board of education meetings um under god indivisible with liberty and justice thank you thank you this is a full of minutes this is from the may 10th 2021 meeting on stage does someone like to make a motion to accept mr carlson thank you for a second thank you any discussion yes mr brown yes ms cardozo yes ms carlson yes mr davis yeah mr demayo abstain ms eichler upstate mr reed miss hubbard yes miss burke yes mr howard yes is the krebs yes okay thank you demotion passes um the next item is the student report yes so i see allison has joined us this evening and um i am going to allow her to make introductions

002but i would at least like to officially welcome marin coronado she is our rising junior and will be joining the board of education as the student representative for the next two years i had a really delightful meeting with her uh in the last couple days before school so i will let allison and marin uh take it away great thank you okay thank you dr byers so i'm going to start with the high school report so that school year wrapped up last tuesday with seniors graduating at westville musical the same day despite the unique setting and somewhat inclement weather of the graduation it was a success in the class of 2021 really appreciated being able to have such a great ceremony then high schoolers returned their one-to-one devices on the 7th after finishing final assignments they

003did so in a spartan seminar session and the process went very smoothly next one book one amity has been introduced to all incoming and returning high school students this year's theme is social justice and the oboe club and library have made plenty of resources and titles available so students can easily find a book of interest to them lastly students are putting the final touches on their production of anastasia even after the school year has ended this hard work from students and teachers alike can be seen at the end of june showings of the musical so like dr beyer said i'm super excited to introduce mayor she's a rising junior and has been selected as the new junior student representative for the board of ed carolyn and i are really proud of this decision and we

004believe she's going to make a great representative so marin go ahead hi guys uh thank you ali for introducing me my name is marin coronaga and i will be your junior representative for the next two years i'm very excited to be part of the board of education in the amity middle schools the recently graduated eighth graders are getting ready to come to the high schools and the high school counselors visited amity middle school orange on june 1st and amity middle school bethany on the third and the students were able to meet with their counselors that they will work with when high school starts in the fall and the amity advocates club shared insight regarding the transition to high school in orange several middle school students shared their talents through virtual performances in june with the

005end-of-year art show and music performances which highlighted some of the outstanding work students said in the creative arts this year the 8th grade class also had an end-of-year picnic that was sponsored by the ptso and we would like to thank the ptso for sponsoring and giving the 8th grade undevea treats for the middle school students in bethany all 7th grade students participated in a field day to celebrate all the hard work students have put in this year and the class had a series of events that were organized by the teachers and helped to build teamwork and communication skills between everyone the eighth grade of bethany participated in a drive drive-up ceremony on the june 7th after some last-minute changes and although this was not the in-person ceremony that everyone hoped for the event was well

006received and allowed for the inmate administrators and teachers to spend moments of reflection laughter and celebration as they wave goodbye to the graduating eighth grade class the eighth graders also had their annual trip to holiday hill where they were able to participate in games and outdoor activities as they celebrated their hard work and kinship after a difficult year of school we are sending best wishes to the new amity high school class of 2025 and cannot wait to meet them next year this concludes the amity middle school report and then i have one more thing and it's from caroline so i'm sorry allison go ahead so as you all know caroline is a part of the class of 2021 and was our senior representative she cannot make tonight's meeting but i have a few words on

007her behalf so hi everyone i'm sorry i couldn't attend tonight's meeting i was unfortunately unable to change my work shift to be here but i still wanted to say a very big thank you to all the board of ed members thank you for being so receptive to the student opinion and for listening to what ali olivia ella and i have had to say thank you also for allowing us students to serve as non-voting members and for allowing us to take a more prominent role in meetings and community happens happenings it has been a meaningful two years serving on the board and i will hopefully be able back again back soon to visit thank you again and so that actually concludes this report sorry about that thanks al we appreciate it and uh does anyone have

008any comments or questions for our student representatives we appreciate all you've done uh alison and caroline and uh you know we look forward to working with merrick for the next couple years and uh everyone have a safe summer and we look forward to seeing you uh back in august okay moving on uh the next item is the one book one amber summer 2020 so i would like to introduce mrs shevin who is one of the one with one yemenity advisors and yeah come on up on the other side of the tv that's great oh good okay as well as two of our students who are part of the one book one amity process all right so here i am backstage at anastasia i just want if you're wondering what's behind me it's because i should

009be out in a tent helping students change costumes but i was happy to come and just fill you a little bit on the plan for tonight and um i see colby nicole are you there too okay oh yeah there you are hi um so i'm sorry i can't be there in person but i we thought that we would show you a video that was put together by the students um you know that we're an unusual group at amity because we truly are students teachers counselors administrators all kind of working together um you know on this school read you know all school initiatives so we put together a four minute video and with your indulgence i think it will tell the whole story of what we're trying to do this summer and then if there are

010any things we can fill in after we'll do that so i'm going to share my screen i hope you'll be able to hear okay you can let me know if you cannot um it's going to take me just a second to do this correctly it's not that i haven't been doing this every day all year but here we go okay here is our reveal video grammarly can help you quickly and confidently so you never have to slow down at work stay on top of dear amity students families and faculty this year one book one anime oboa will be part of a school-wide focus on social justice we take seriously our school's mission statement that includes the goal that each of our students will grow to be a literate caring creative and effective world citizen we

011believe that we can help contribute to that goal by promoting social justice one book at a time and allowing for the time and opportunity to read about talk about and act upon the issues that we believe are important to making our world a fairer more just place this year you will once again have a choice of books either fiction or non-fiction all we ask is that you read a book that has a social justice focus we have selected the following topics gender and sexual identity here you would respect and learn more about sex assigned at birth versus gender identity gender expression and sexual orientation as well as learn how to advocate for lgbtq youth within this topic you might also learn about reproductive justice or violence and discrimination against women environmental awareness in this topic

012you would become aware of the natural environment and make choices that benefit the earth rather than hurt it you might also read books that help you become aware of our impact on the environment through conservation of energy and water recycling and activism mental health awareness with this category we hope to promote awareness about mental health issues and to reduce stigma and discrimination against those with mental illnesses race and ethnicity combating racial and ethnic injustice and learning to live and work together in a diverse world and ability and access promote the belief that having a disability or physical difference is a natural part of human diversity and to celebrate that diversity learn the dangers of ableism a form of discrimination or social prejudice against people with disabilities so basically what we mean by social justice is

013this social justice is the view that everyone deserves equal economic political and social rights and opportunities here are a few things you should know before selecting this fall when we are back in school there will be a brief assessment on your chosen book asking you to write about what you learned or discovered in your book and to support your response to specific evidence from the text this short writing sample is meant to let your teachers know your thoughts about the book and to give them a first impression of you as a reader writer and thinker we will also be following up throughout the school year with many different kinds of activities discussions and learning opportunities run by various ahs organizations and clubs so reading the book is only the beginning of our focus on social

014justice we will provide a long list of suggestions for each category along with resources to find more titles pick one that suits you in terms of topic and reading level and that is not part of the ahs curriculum there are great many ways to get a good book libraries are a great place to start your town and school libraries are great resources and getting a library card is really simple and can be done online or at the library visit the ahs library website to learn how to obtain a library card for your particular town if you choose you can also purchase a book online or in a bookstore and you can use an audio format as well please reach out if you have any trouble getting a book all right so go ahead colby yeah

015as you all saw um that is our that is our topic for the year social justice and this is just going off how we want further discussion and it's not very restricting because as you saw there is a plethora of topics that you can choose from and anywhere from environment to mental health to race and we just want to create awareness for this topic and um this really started with this past year and we just want to keep discussion going into this next year and continue three years on yeah as colby said this is a theme that's kind of been continuing through amity to just like better the environment in total as you said working with different topics that will just overall better the environment of the school and the town and all three towns

016and our community as a whole so one of the things that a lot of people are asking is why we're one book when amity and it's actually a ton of different books but it is that we could get detectives on these different topics and then hopefully it would be a new way for us to kind of teach each other about these different things that we learned which would really work to better the community in the end in the end we're trying to unite it thank you both before any of you go just for the board because not everybody's been here um you know one book one amity i know back in um 2018 really um sort of ignited the discussion on race and racism when they selected all americans was selected we looked at the

017issues around mental health and mental health awareness particularly for uh teenagers and so by um having the the one book one amity club and faculty advisors select social justice as a theme we're able to continue and expand on this work in the summer of 2021 but also allow students that opportunity for voice and choice that hopefully is going to inspire dialogue and just lead to increased understanding in our school community so thank you to the advisors as well as to the students who not only picked the theme but then also some of those book choices that go with the 1v18 and i hope everybody reads this summer yeah thank you for the opportunity [Music] yeah thank you so long happy reading okay that brings us to our next item uh public comment um so before

018we start public comment i would like to receive a statement here this statement was also shared with uh anyone coming in tonight that wants to participate so they are aware of this but i would like to read it one more time at this time the board would like to invite members of the public up to the lectern for public health please save your full name and address if you are a student or under 18 years of age please state only your first name each speaker will be allowed to three minutes for public count also the board reserves its right to limit the public comment on any one subject to 20 minutes please note that as a matter of foreign policy the board does not respond to public comments or questions but may discuss the subject

019and a response if appropriate at a future time is there anyone that would like to start us off [Music] good evening my name is jillian patel i am a resident of woodbridge 12 roman hill road and i'm a parent of two daughters of one in grade six going into grade six and the other one i will be in empty high school next year i am one of eighty members of the nba community for diversity equity and inclusion this evening we've been told we only have 20 minutes to voice our concerns so you may hear only from the most important choices in our group the student numbers in our community but i want you to know that we're here to represent all the black asian and white students alumni and parents from woodbridge bethany and orange

020who are concerned about the current and persistent culture of intolerance that exists at anthony high school among students teachers and administrators tonight you will hear from brave students about recent incidents of bio racist bullying and you will see just one example of that fully uh that happened in many of the written comments that our group has submitted you will hear our outrage about educational decisions that are being made they're very offensive and you may hear today why the administration believes they're doing enough to combat this culture but what you will hear tonight will demonstrate to you why what is being done is not enough no supporting diversity equity inclusion is not putting up the plaque in a hallway no supporting diversity equity inclusion is not a summer social justice rate no supporting diversity equity inclusion

021is not amity administrations administrators continuing to violate connecticut bullying legislation by allowing students using racist language to go unpunished and no supporting diversity equity and inclusion is not as superintendent buyers stated that this administration honors the ideas and concepts presented by student clubs and organizations when those student clubs and organizations have ideas that are in themselves racist and offensive no supporting diversity equity inclusion is not optional training or workshops for students and staff but mandatory commitment that all adults in the building understand and are modeling the core tenets of tolerance and honoring people from diverse backgrounds supporting diversity inclusion is ensuring students from all backgrounds feel safe supported and nurtured and cared cared for and their backgrounds their traditions and cultures are honored and respected and the disrespectful honor is shown by administrators and teachers

022as the leaders in the community every day and yes supporting diversity equity and inclusion is undertaking a series of timely measures we will work with the army board of education and administration to ensure our implemented and that you will find examples of in our common pocket submission we request a meeting with the administration and their representative the nba board event to discuss these measures and yes our group will continue to be present these meetings to ensure these measures and more are implemented and then all of our students from all backgrounds feel safe and supported in our schools good evening and thank you for the opportunity to speak my name is nina carmeli and i'm a rising junior in the class of 2023. when i joined amd my freshman year i was determined to be a

023part of every club every organization everything that our school has to offer because i thought that our community was perfect and i wanted to represent this amazing place that i call home and we have so many clubs athletic programs academic resources and more to make the high school a welcoming and thriving place but unfortunately not all students are able to fully enjoy these wonderful aspects of our school over the past few weeks and months i've been listening hearing countless outrageous and horrifying stories of my closest friends classmates and peers who have shared their terrible experiences regarding being discriminated against or targeted because the color of their skin their religion sexual orientation anything that differentiates them md claims to celebrate diversity and encourage inclusivity with the board of education as well as the has fallen short

024to properly deal with its challenges i was disappointed when i realized that the perfect place i wanted to represent and play such a large role in was not as great as i made it out to be i was embarrassed to learn that students that contacted their guidance counselors reported the incident the anonymous tip line or even went as far as speaking to the with the administration itself were turned empty-handed still feeling like an outcast which defeats the point of coming out coming forward at all tomorrow it may it may be me so i can't stay silent and watch as others are discriminated against while these issues go beyond family we all need to be the change we would like to see in the world the student body the administration and the board of education i'm

025aware that the one pokemon anemity topic of this summer is social justice and that the adl is being brought in to teach students how to stand up to hate and while these are great first steps this is simply not enough the adl nor any other group that is brought to the school on its own does not solve the problem making students better leaders in our community and being aware of the issues that occur is only part of the solution we must also have teachers faculty and administration take active part in these workshops and learn how to address the inclusive inclusivity and diversity issues that are deeply rooted at enemy only if we have all of the previously mentioned parties involved including parents we have a chance to make a dent at this complicated issue amity

026is defined as a place of peace and of harmony but right now our enmity does not feel like that i urge you to take a hard look at the reality that we are living in and use your role as the leaders and models of our school to listen and act and make preparing students to leave this school as informed citizens who are ready to conquer racism inclusivity and diversity problems of the world a priority this way we can all be the change you want to see in the world thank you hi my name is sage valia and i'm a rising senior at harvard high school i've come here today to talk about family high school's toxic and racist environment over the last couple years i have run as an individual because that's what happens when

027you go to high school but growing up in a place where being different is not recognized is especially difficult and i'm also here today to talk about how the environment is not about my own personal experiences but rather experiences of other individuals over the last month i've heard several individuals who have been targeted by hate speech many of which have gone to administration and many of which have been ignored our school needs to take action and create legislation or create some type of policy to target specific speech against black and african-american students and any other students who are facing any type of bullying there needs to be some accountability with all members of the staff in this school and as a person of color who represents the black student union from the school i would

028like to see some more uh collaboration with students of color particularly in black hairstyle i'd also like to see the teachers sticking out for students of color over the last couple years i have seen a couple of a handful of teachers that i could i could you know counter my figures who actually talked about the realities of the world's history and you know from it other than a whitewash perspective and we need to change our curriculum and programming to accommodate for the ever-changing world that's going to recognize diversity and if amy doesn't do that soon we'll be left behind good evening my name is judy alfred i'm the ceo of the jewish federation of greater new haven and i'm sad to have to be here tonight but i'm proud to stand here as an ally

029of all the diversity of populations of students and families that make up this incredible community that we all live in just a couple years ago we were together at amity high school discussing this exact same topic and that time we came together because jewish students were feeling unsafe at harmony and my heart broke for them and i had such great hope that change would come but sadly here we are today and change has not come to happen and these kids are breaking my heart again and i really am just here to plead with you all that you take the steps that are lasting it's not just lip service we don't just stand in the moment and say we're going to do something about it but we're going to take back the future of this community

030so that all people of all backgrounds of all ethnicities of all expressions can feel safe and can see a bright bright future so that we can ensure that the kids that come up behind these kids never have to confront this again thank you hi my name is sharon storygard i'm a resident of woodbridge 27 deepwood road i have kids in the system and i'm a pediatrician to them students in this community i'm going to answer three questions i'm going to speak to three issues why now why here and why you why now we live in a country made of immigrants and with a history of slavery our history has powerful and violent repercussions we no longer live completely sheltered and unaware of racism and people have different experiences within our country and the world in

031order for the next generation to live with more peace health meaning and prosperity they will need to be people who are aware of these issues and know how to work and leave morally with them in mind why here our towns have the capacity to lead in thought and education they lay next to a small city with a famous university that develops amazing advances in science philosophy and art from it we drive home to our beautiful towns of trees and trails a town where your kids bus driver may be the same farmer who grows you the sweetest strawberries of the summer a small town with worldly possibilities it is a beautiful place with plentiful resources not just financially but intellectually and spiritually these towns have the will and the resources now to seize this moment to

032make progress for our children why you the lord of ed we can do this work at our dinner tables but more is needed for systemic progress the goal of a public education system is to give everyone access to learn how to be a successful citizen of the world a robust education system teaches more than standardized academics it teaches history in a way that fosters more questions it promotes discussion that leads young people to see issues from different perspectives it readies them for the constant change of modern life a nimble way of thinking that has the capacity to adapt and evolve being an educator is an enlightened profession you have been elected to help our education system recruit retain and train educators that are enlightened and see this as their charge you have been elected by

033us to do everything in your power to have our school district graduate people who can think and work well together in the ever-changing modern world thank you good afternoon i'm samuel bay i'm a rising sophomore at amity high school and a member of the inclusion at henderson i'm here to speak today about my experiences with racism and mistreatment here at avid i feel unwanted and unsafe here at family i moved to orange when i was 9 years old in elementary school i wasn't allowed to play voice square by some other kids i was told instead to go back to asia i wasn't accepted to play at recess at the end of sixth grade i wrote a speech much like this one i'm reading now and i presented that speech i hope things would change for

034the better in middle school i was wrong here at amity middle school orange i was made fun of my small eyes i was called a ching chong a chain sometimes by the same classmates that harass me in elementary school and sometimes their classmates i think 8th grade i started to report every time i hope things would change for the better i was wrong instead the principal called me a disappointment to the school for constantly coming to the office and reporting these incidents i was not provided resolution instead i was shamed by my teachers in high school this year as a freshman at amity high i hoped that things would change for the better i was wrong i was called more slurs on top of being berated for my race i was insulted as i struggled

035finding my sexual identity one friday as i left the school two juniors said that my hair made me look like a my weekend was rude again i felt alienated and unwanted now i'm sure the board of education can exactly not represent happy however these hates of these acts of hate have defined my animal experience i'm speaking today because i want change for the better i don't want an apology and i don't want pity i want change hi i'm cynthia i'm a rising junior and i'll be reading a statement from our front otherizing junior who will wish his journey when a student walks through the doors of amity and sees the problems we shouldn't feel powerless to change the issue i shouldn't have to think to myself there's no point in bringing up my problem because

036nothing will be done to actually fix therapy but i do after seeing firsthand my friends attempt to contact the administration whether it be to be anonymous to blind or directly emailing with faculty i've watched as each one has promised help only to be left continued and after hearing even more stories over the past two weeks of other students experiences and attempts to contact the administration only to be mostly ignored i started to lose hope in the current state of family you give us these spartan seminars lectures and activities about inclusive inclusivity and diversity and you tell us that amity is a safe environment to voice our concerns and issues but when we bring up these issues to you there's nothing meaningful done sleeping these issues under the rug is not inclusivity it is not diversity

037now is the time for change to work towards a better amity where our voices are properly heard my name is moniquez and i'm the parent of a rising sophomore i live in ridge connecticut i'm here because of my daughter who i love the early she joined nominee high school in january halfway through the school year um halfway through the school year as a freshman and practice that she was at an international school despite joining emily at the time of the yoga academy and also the baseballs what about the available team i'm proud that uh the transition into america was seamless thanks to the administration and staff who made it easy for my daughter to quickly adapt to the hybrid hybrid learning model with ease i'm also proud of teachers who are supportive of her that

038she worked on catching up on post work uh halfway through the school year it was not easy but she did it she's smart curious every time you young lady and i'm proud of her so some of the concerns that have brought me here today the concern the concern that i'd like to raise at the border this evening is related to a few incidents that have happened to my daughter over the past few months the issues don't just affect my daughter as far as i come to understand but rather they are pervasive and desperately impact black students and family since studying a nominee my daughter has experienced derogatory racist comments directed towards her in five separate occasions from two white students and each instance she was called the n-word on average that's one very derogatory comment

039each month since you joined average january as her parent my heart sings but i try to imagine what she has to deal with just for going to school of the five incidents four of them were who she had never met before the first incident a full week went by before my daughter reported the incident to the school administration despite persistent encouragement from us as parents after recording the incident for the first time she did not feel like the administration believed her a few weeks went by it was not until she provided proof in the form of a screenshot of the students admitting to calling my daughter did the administration take that seriously and take action we are grateful for the action that was taken however they still undermine fears and anxiety that these behaviors in

040general will not go away and that many acts that cannot be proven because they happen too quickly for the impacted student to contribute evidence school is an institution where children are going to be authenticated at their minimum our children we learn to be good citizens of the world additionally parents expect that school administrators teachers and staff will provide a safe place for our young students that allows them to thrive and reach their god-given potential so my question to other work here today is what is armenia high school doing to ensure that all students have a safe environment and such experience are mitigated and when they do have them they address smoothly and more assurances that the administration gives parents like me to assure us that issues such as these will be met with administrative good

041evening my name is kim franklin from klein franklin and i reside in woodbridge um i am the third oldest of 15 children 11 of whom were adopted and seven who attended amity and i am here to read a letter on behalf of my youngest third youngest sister tatiana who love damn so i want to just read this to you on her behalf who lives in san diego is a public defender but really has some concerns and wanted to share it with you to whom this may concern i graduated from amity high school in 2005. while i received a fantastic education my experiences at amity left me in an identity crisis if i remember correctly i was one of five black students in my graduating class one of the black students was my sister while at

042amity i experienced microaggressions daily slowly over time these daily and persistent insults to my blackness resulted in my developing low self-esteem and contributed to my depressive tendencies as a black person i felt like i didn't really belong yes i was the captain of the track team and yes i had many friends but at the same time i felt lonely isolated and misunderstood i heard disparaging comments about my skin being too dark and needing to stay out of the sun i was told that i was undateable because i was black at one point i brought i bought skin bleaching cream in hopes that i could lighten my skin and fit in i developed the false perception that i was inferior to my classmates i truly believed that because i was black i wasn't good enough i

043grew up believing that i wasn't as smart as my fellow classmates that the only reason i got into a good college was because i was black i became so insecure about this that when i did tell people where i was going to college university of michigan i became i immediately followed up with all of my achievements i remember that so that way they knew i earned my spot at the same time i would receive compliments that i wasn't like other black people because i spoke well and i dressed nice i constantly heard that i wasn't really black and that i was basically a white girl that i wasn't like them this further contributed to my belief that it was better to be white this further contributed to mine to me hating my dark skin i

044harshly learned that i wasn't white when my friends who were upset by me through my blackness in my face they made it clear that i wasn't like them because i was black one time the student from amity created the following screen name you gotta spell this it's r-e-g-g-i-n reagan and i believe there were some numbers after it this classmate began to message me about how i didn't belong at amity and they continued to discuss how my mother gave me up i later learned this student was a friend of mine who had gotten into an argument with when she became mad at me she believed it was appropriate to call me a hateful word and go as far as to create a screen name of it backwards mr reagan just if you could finish your thought

045please she spewed hateful and racist rhetoric at me and she decided that i was no longer worthy of being her friend and thought it was okay to use my blackness against me and so the request from tatiana here was that i write my story to urge change at amity and to hopefully start discussion with the school evening thank system to the yemeni regional board of education for allowing public comments my name is joseph ross and i'm a resident of woodridge having moved to the community with my wife and two children now 17 and 18 in 2010 like many patterns of means education and privilege we moved to the area because of the benefits we hoped it would confer for our children the opportunity to grow up in wide open spaces with lots of trees and

046trails to heights and excellent schools our kids first experience at beecher road school in the multi-age group program strongly validated our decision to move to the area the teachers created a classroom community that not only afforded opportunities for self-directed learning and individual attention but they also emphasized the value and importance of diversity the kids learned about one another their families and cultures differences were celebrated unfortunately for my kids each successive year the amity schools after the completion of the program particularly in the high school less resembled this ideal school environment and was instead increasingly sowed with division and hate examples of intolerance were common including racism sexism and anti-semitism and other types of religious intolerance my kids have described to me a school environment where there is frequent use of the animal including in the

047presence of teachers and where white students tease black students for being black explaining that the ku klux klan is going to get them talking about the ghetto and caricaturing them using other ugly racial stereotypes my kids have described to me a school environment where female students are disrespected by medicine students where some teachers are both subtly and not so subtly dismissive of female students including being visually annoyed by questions from and less likely to call on female students and my kids have described to me a school environment where swastikas are commonly found drawn on the bathroom walls about three years after our community received unwanted attention for homes being vandalized and hateful messages being heard throughout the school such as the jews deserve to die being an excellent school is more than graduation rates and

048test scores no school is perfect and i do not expect the teachers and administrators to take responsibility for every student's action or utterance but they set the tone and establish the culture of the school as was done for my kids in the multi-age group program so long ago and the current culture in the amity schools can be described as nothing less than awful i can only imagine how minoritized students must feel having to come to the middle or high schools each day knowing they will be teased insulted and ridiculed while teachers and other authority figures stand by our community is not alone in facing these same issues but there are concrete steps we can take to change the culture in our school district i hope the board will take these concerns seriously and work with

049the schools and their administrators to establish a culture that fosters diversity equity and inclusion going forward thank you hi my name is erin williamson i come to you today as a community member and as a parent of two children that will at some point in the future be entering reality they also come to you with other friends who also have children who will be entering this community we have children currently at major we sit on a future diversity committee for the past few years our school has repeatedly received media attention regarding the intolerance that currently exists within our school system a couple of years ago it was for anti-semitism and most recently it's for racism you've heard today that these issues have gone long as far back as kids who graduated in 2005 you've heard

050that they happen daily on a daily basis here at the school this is a pervasive problem these are not just a few bad kids saying a few bad things this is to stem it within our community for every student that spoke tonight there's 20 kids that didn't that didn't feel safe that didn't feel that they could come here and talk about what they see and witness because speaking truth to power is hard coming in front of you and as an adult and talking is hard imagine what it has been like for these youth who have the courage to share their experiences with you knowing that there are potentially real consequences to their actions among their peers teachers and the administration here ensuring that amity is offering all students a safe and nurturing learning environment that's

051the administration's responsibility students should have a clear understanding that any form of identity bullying will be taken seriously and responded to swiftly that is not happening you heard that tonight that is not happening and it's not happening consistently the current focus of what's happening in our school is focusing on the kids the book is great having the plaque is great that's not what we need is professional development for our superintendent for our principal for our teachers what we need is clear the board that clearly states what their expectations are for our superintendent and our teachers we need accountability as members of the diversity committee at feature i can tell you we know what can happen when a board communicates that this is an area of interest to them to their superintendent we've seen it happen

052recently we have a new superintendent we have a new board coming in and they have clearly said this will be a strategic priority in beecher elementary we have seen that superintendent proactively take steps to enhance his own professional development as well as the professional development of his teachers that is what needs to happen here we don't need more for the students although i shouldn't say we don't need more we need stuff for the students but most importantly it's the administration that needs to change it's the administration that needs the professional development and the training so i stand here tonight as somebody who's going to have kids entering this school and right now is someone who's scared to have kids entering the school i'm scared of what my kids will be exposed to i'm scared of

053what my kids will experience and i say that as a white person i can't imagine what my friends behind me are experiencing hey uh i think that you guys know what's going on right so there's no need to make you hear me say what my children's experience been which has been terrible to the point where my daughter is not going to a boarding school for a freshman year all right so i'm just gonna get to the point i don't wanna waste your time on my time i think that if i just look around the room right this second i think you guys might be great people i'm sure you are you love your children you love your families and we have wonderful people but how could we have this conversation when i'm looking around this

054room right now to be honest you guys all look the same the same color right it's been like 20 years with someone else's a sibling or or whatever a parent and yet we haven't solved this issue why because when i look around the room it's the same talk the same people who who has a seat at the table no one that looks like me the one that looks like them or i don't know get back there so what can i possibly say to you to make a difference at this point because i'm looking at the faces again i think you probably are wonderful people in some way but this is not showing up in your district it's not showing up in your schools and it's not sure that there are towns right what you keep

055telling me over and over is that i may complain but my voice is pointless right now my drug comes from a third world country yes it's called haiti you know as a country right quote but i don't think it's a country but when i'm experiencing things in this town i don't know which one is more of a show right for my kids because i don't want to pay 85 000 a year to send my kids to boarding school because i don't feel like they're safe in our school that i'm paying taxes for right so please what would you like us to do to make a change having a good heart is not enough no one cares about your heart if it's not something you're changing no one cares about your apology if it's not something

056you're going to make right no one cares about any of those things what we care about is change right we you want all your kids to be safe you want your family to be safer they go to school most of all school right where can we be safe if it's not our school we're not talking about school shooting we're talking about education right if you're only learning about your your essential curriculum you're already telling me i'm a second class and i'm not anyone in here for that ideology because it's something that's been here for a long long time maybe 400 years whether it'd be the first couple black students walking into the first innovative school being spit out or you know military has to walk them in but the curriculum never changed they're still not

057welcome right whether it be asian or wherever they come from they're not welcome this may not be something you think about because you're white and the world caters to you for the rest of us not so much right and i'm not looking for the world to give it to me i'm looking for the world to be fair and so far our district is saying it doesn't matter i don't care right so am i gonna come back here for my grandchildren maybe 20 years from now i have this discussion again i'm worried that i might all right so if you're going to be in a position of health you're not here because you're more important position that you hold you are here because you're supposed to be doing a job to make things better for other

058people right no one cares about our ego i'm a teacher no one cares about me being a teacher unless i'm going to make a difference in my student's lives then i shouldn't have the job right finish your thoughts we're at three and a half okay my thought is i feel like this is not going to work because of the fact that there isn't enough diversity even sitting here looking at this board and i don't know how we can change it at the moment thank you mr chair we are about um it looks like 35 minutes i'm not sure if there's one last person that would like to speak or anything else is there any other people that would like to speak okay thank you everyone okay uh moving on to it number seven the superintendent's

059report so i know that the board of education does not have an opportunity to address public comments but i would like to take a moment of my superintendence report to at least express some of the work that we have been doing um the board of education first of all may have observed that i along with many of my administrators here have selected to wear red this evening to support the public comments and as a symbol of our commitment to hearing the community's concerns and then acting to affect change i'm actually grateful for this evening and the opportunity to hear the perspectives and experiences that were presented here this evening and will continue to listen we don't disagree with the suggestions for change that were presented this evening and are fully committed to taking the steps

060to continue to create the positive tolerant and supportive environment that saw that is taught i know that you as board of education took a step in may with the adoption of policy 411.3 a minority recruitment we have provided professional development to all of our staff for the past three years through the nccj and through courageous conversations as evidenced earlier this evening we are committed to continuing conversations and discussions with students and teachers through one book one amity and i know that i along with some of my school administrators have already had courageous conversations in explaining and defending the choice of a social justice theme we have revised our high school social studies curriculum to include a more inclusive worldview and a less eurocentric view and the implementation of readers workshop next year will open opportunities

061for middle school students to read texts from diverse authors and representing different perspectives we look forward to making the black and latinx studies elective part of our program of studies and have ideas on how we might move ahead of the state department of education's time frame the high school administration has worked with student clubs and groups to promote equity and inclusion including diversity in action a student-run organization that collaborates with the school administration to take actions to create a safe and welcoming school climate for all students our high school administration participated in book study this year where we collectively had our own courageous conversations about race within our schools we examined case studies and talked about the ways in which we can change the small things this year we expanded the interest survey and anti-defamation

062leagues program no place for hate to the entire student body as part of the commitment to let all voices be heard and at the end of the school year we had 32 students and 31 faculty who expressed interest in learning more about the no place for hate program i see tonight is pivotal and that it provided me a chance to listen to the concerns of our students and the ideas for concrete substantive improvement outside of the board of education meeting this evening no one has yet reached out to my office to speak to me but i am ready to keep listening as are all the amity administrators i want to work with parents students and our faculty to address the reality that students do feel unwelcome at anity and while we have done work in

063this area clearly more work needs to be done and i am committed to that i want to thank the public for speaking tonight and look forward to conversations and dialogue in the future you can sure so in the personnel report um i think the only thing that you'll see is that if you have attended the board's recognition event we've had a couple more retirements since then so you will see those noted as well as several transfers as people are moving around and we have some of our new hires for opening up the 21-22 school year uh so um really it's just kind of the start of the summer high hearing but we are being prepared for august students actually summarized a great deal of some of the superintendent's um reports so far um i will

064say i'd like to um express my gratitude for the school administration we had three very different um promotional ceremonies this year although i would say dr tracy's was the most similar because we had to do another drive through which we're getting pretty good at um but um the ceremony that was up on the lacrosse field was really amazing and to see that facility actually from the perspective of the field shows you how much work went into that improvement and certainly the senior class advisors and the high school administration um for pulling off an amazing graduation um at the um at the westfield music bowl was pretty exceptional so i also know that in the superintendence report there is um updates on proven 19. unfortunately i don't really have terribly many of those to give at

065the moment because we've been out of school for a while um but i will say that you know i know i'm already getting um questions about next school year and um what our plans are in terms of reopening um i can say that on june 23rd as part of the rfsr funding we will have to publish a reopening plan that reopening plan can only be based off of the information that we currently have which is essentially to continue all the practices that we have been doing so in publishing that plan i will just give you a heads up it's going to say that we are going to have students wearing masks we will continue with social distancing we'll continue our contact tracing protocols and then probably what we'll do throughout the summer is as dph

066and the csde give us more information we can start to make adjustments and tweaks to that plan um but just so that you know initially going up it's going to look exactly like what it did for this past spring because that's the guidance that we currently have at this time we as an administrative team will have um standing meetings every tuesday throughout the summer they will start an hour after the standing dph meetings that i go to so that way um as soon as we get news we will gather together and just use those as opportunities to figure out what reopening for next school year is like and then we'll share that information with the community as quickly as we can possibly get it and then the last um facet of the superintendent's report is

067i would um like to invite mr downhour and he asked me if you could speak this evening in a manner that would actually um allow him to kind of address the board of education sort of in a more personal way as opposed to public content excellent thank you um so my name is peter donner i represent the teachers the and the education association um i want to thank dr buyers for the opportunity to be included here today i want to share with the board that i believe that the teachers in the district are in a good position coming out of the pandemic and looking forward to next year as cliche as the expression has become in the last year it is true that we have gone through an unprecedented time that no one could have

068predicted the teachers this year had to do what no other person in the field of education has ever had to do we had to teach in a pandemic with shifting safety protocols and new basically put together teaching models that were influenced largely by non-education professionals and we did this i know there are still challenges ahead and as always animal teachers will continue to put our students at the forefront of our considerations here at amity we are coming out of this year on solid round last year the aea and the board as you know either directly or through the superintendent engaged in three periods of negotiations in one year once we had to um once with an moa at the start of the pandemic in order to figure out how to finish last year then almost

069immediately we had to start negotiating over the summer much more intensive negotiation on how we returned to school last fall and finally which i wish hadn't happened that way our regular contract negotiations had to occur uh in our three-year cycle in in the middle of something else that we were doing while regular negotiations were mostly familiar with the um the two previous ema's were unprecedented in some ways we led the way amity led the way we were one of only a few districts in the state that had an agreement in place before the students came back into the building that's largely because of superintendent and i not giving out i suppose even while at times disagreeing we were able to provide options for teachers who are at greater risk given their personal circumstances as i

070know you are aware there were times when our disagreements boiled over and became public even then the superintendent and i were able to work together and move forward over the last 14 months we were able to move forward because of the willingness of the superintendent to engage with the teachers and their various representatives to me mostly va received daily hvac reports thank you for those which i'm sure you were thrilled to provide every day weekly detailed covet updates a quick response protocol for safety issues that arose and ultimately clear safety protocols and mitigation strategies that allow us to engage in the purpose of school teaching and learning we had vital time necessary to rework adapt and enhance our curriculum lessons and assessments we have learned a lot over the past year one thing is that

071dual instruction that is teaching remotely and in-person students simultaneously is not an appropriate method for teaching students and i ask that you do not consider that as an option going forward i would like to take a moment to publicly acknowledge acknowledge the efforts of the custodians and the technology department it is not lost on me that when i made a request or pushed for additional safety requests or additional tech support on behalf of the teachers that the actual tasks would often land in their departments their unwavering steadfast dedication made it possible for us to open schools and do our jobs and i wanted to say thank you to both of those departments also the accomplishments accomplishments of this year happened with the continuing engagement of dr byers and her administrative team i have been grateful

072that the building principles have been open to both coded and normal instructional issues that teachers brought to their attention at the middle schools the aea representatives gauged with their principles almost daily i worked at the high school so kind of by default i worked with miss man lucky her i got we talked daily it got to the point that if i didn't talk to her for a couple of days i would stop by just to check even in the midst of our strongest disagreements mrs miss man and i were able to maintain continue working together we each knew and trusted that the other advocated for what was best for teachers and students after sitting through public comments it is my thought that i would want no one else in that position other than you to

073help us through what's coming ahead i know that we have to do work on 21 22 or 20 21 and 2020 so i they got to change this year uh the reopening plan over the summer and i think we're in a good place for that in the fall i'm a strong believer in this institution and recognize that we are all necessary for us to continue to work to continue the work that is coming i will always maintain we handle our issues through education we are an institution of education [Laughter] thank thank you for that statement okay moving on to correspondence recycler do you have any correspondence discussion he had two letters of correspondence um a thank you note from anna and another thank you note from mary carlson um also we had um some written

074public comment that i'd like to acknowledge and we'll receive this this afternoon from matt mcdermott tatiana klein joseph ross nina carmelli samuel bay matthew cohen and ian gross uh glaston great yeah thanks for saying that i should have asked you that at the end thank you for saying that great okay moving on to the chairman's report um so i would like to formally recognize a few of our our board members our fellow board members who are leaving us at the end of this month i can't believe it um we have three uh robin berg sheila krevin and uh pacquiao and i just like to kind of go through each one and just say a little something about them and and then if someone else would like to speak if anyone would like to say anything

075uh the floor is yours um and this is basically uh the same things i said over at the the dinner we had a couple of weeks back that was for the board recognition at dinner but uh it was an event for retired events and for board recognition so um first robin uh robin burke from woodbridge robin served five and a half years miami board of vet she participated in the curriculum committee she was our aces liaison and she was part of her school security committee and robin's background as an attorney served the board of ed well robin can always be counted on to weigh in on contractional items and policy changes and how they affected our community thank you robin um number two uh is sheila mcrevin from woodbridge sheila was a board event member

076for seven years she was the chair of the personnel committee uh also chair of the ad hoc shared services committee sheila participated on the policy committee school safety committee and was our cabling exam she was also served the board as secretary uh sheila's knowledge of our board policies and procedures was the benefit of the board of ad for many years i would say that after tom's departure from the board a couple of years back sheila became our parliamentarian which was very helpful in running our meetings thank you sheila and last but not least pat has been on the board of ed for 12 years uh she has chaired the personnel committee uh the facilities committee and is also her current chair of the ufc uh she's been on many ad hoc committees including superintendent hiring

077committee three times once during a tornado she served on the fuel cell committee school security and volunteered many times for representing yamity for many personal uh personnel contracts and countless nights for three a.m um and pat actually was was with me uh serving on that in that capacity uh this past december january so i appreciate all the time you put in additionally pat is our vice chair of the board of that pat has always been there for me to assist in managing the quarterback her involvement in the community and history the board of ed was a huge help in navigating the borders especially during difficult times i could always count on pat to be there during my my time on the board of ed as a member and sjr thank you pat well this is

078the quietest group we've ever had what you said is perfect and and i really enjoyed the time with the three of you and i you know pat's been here uh for two years longer than i but i always have counted on your guidance and your your recognition of the situation sheila has been a great sharpening stone to push and pull and talk to and and and robin you know whenever we've had um whenever we had policy and you would always catch the thing that would be in there that we would all just read right through and you would catch it every time and so i really have enjoyed you know you guys professionally and personally on the board for these years so thank you so much yes i would just like to say to the

079three amazing strong women leaders who were from woodbridge and welcomed me to this board and kind of took me under their wing i appreciate your guidance and just because you're leaving do not expect that it won't call you for advice anytime patrick our numbers are changing and we're not going into this protection thank you and thank you all for serving so well it's been such an honor to work with you all in the 12 years that i've been on the board i don't know that i've ever had such a wonderful board in the sense of all 13 members just as focused with the administration and this amazing superintendent and our amazing administration faculty and staff we are just so blessed we have an amazing team so i thank you for the experience and for your

080amazing commitment to amity and our future as an amazing institution we got this thank you guys okay moving on we have committee reports um aces for less so this will be my final report from aces um in the interest of saving time i just wanted to highlight one um aspect that has happened here ace has been very busy they successfully completed the purchase of the chase collegiate property last month in waterbury this will be the new site for the thomas edison magnet school which was previously located in meridian the magnet school is currently accepting applications for the 2021-2022 school year and if anybody would like further information they can feel free to either reach out to me or please contact tom dehaney who's the director of aces thank you thank you okay ad hoc school

081safety mr al all right your final cabe report from me i'm looking forward to another member picking up the baton as i as i hand off but just briefly the legislative wrap-up session was today at 11 o'clock uh they usually make the video of that available if anyone is interested of course that implementer bill is going to be heard tomorrow so there'll be further detail coming from cave on what that is all going to mean and you'll everybody will receive that as email two other things i'd just like to highlight uh there is a summer leadership conference it's an all-day event that's going to take place august 5th from 1 30 to 7 15. that might be an ideal place to learn more maybe either current board members or some of the incoming board members

082might be able to attend that that's um one of the perks that we get for being a cave district so it is um maybe a helpful uh leadership event for some of us to attend and then finally um i just want to draw attention especially in light of comments tonight cape has an ad hoc committee for diversity equity inclusion cabe is committed to helping boards of ed dealing with this this is happening all around the state of course um and i believe that they have a whole host of resources available on the cape website those are all public resources but i know that there are staff members at cave that would be very very happy to work with any district that wants to learn more and do professional development as a board so that the

083board can be full partners in efforts going forward which i look forward to that's it for your kid report all right thanks mr man thank you again for all of your uh hard work and keeping the board of rest of uh the goings-on cave all these years okay moving on to curriculum miss grosso um uh no meeting and there's a report on page 18. i stopped by the other day um the main project right now is the pouring of the track that was completed over a couple days last week and they're waiting for things to settle and then tightening up cables and then they'll start on the middle and um you know hopefully we will be in good shape in what july it's it sounds like probably by the time the track surface is actually

084put down and dried we're probably a little more towards the end of july than in july but with the extension from tpz we don't have that pressure crunch around the july 16th deadline um so we will have plenty of room to get everything completed before the start of the school year and that's about it okay there's a monthly report on page 18 18. and we did uh all of these recommendations by miss bonus that she will go into i'm sure for the render board all at once so the first item is uh discussion console action on the tuition rate for the 21 22 school year and there's a memo in the second on page 19. we are requesting an increase of 3.084 percent or 574 to bring the tuition rate at 19 170 for a

085non-residence next year this is the formula that we use based on we also ask that you set the base rate for special education tuition at 19 623 which is also based off the net term uh people expenditure report for special education there are just additional services that should a specialized student non-resident student enroll that based on their iep if they need those services that the tuition would be adjusted to reflect those costs as well great uh rate for 2122 school year 19 170 and the non-resident special agrees tuition rate at 19 623 plus any additional services thank you carlson yes mr davis yeah mr demeo yes ms eichler yes uh miss hubbard yes mr reed miss burke yes mr howard yes so the next item is discussion impossible action on contracts over 35 the first

086one is the food service contract the district is entering the sixth year of actually a five-year contract the state allowed an extension to uh great numbers because of the epidemic and the difficulty in conducting a bid during the environment the uh the state sets the guidelines and the maximum increase would be the uh cpi index at four point five percent we negotiated a five percent increase this year last year we had a two percent increase uh however this year the cafeteria workers contract was renegotiated the two different fees you see the management fee is basically the charcoal's profit the administrative fee covers corporate supervision financial reporting field auditing marketing purchasing and human resources support for the union and workers under the cafeteria department extension for food services operations for 2021 22 to compass group usa

087chart wells for the proposed amendment and the director of finance and administration is authorized to sign the event thank you exactly um mr davis yes mr davis mr demayo yes miss eichler yes miss hubbard yes mr reed yes miss burke yes yes so the next two items there was revised information provided to the members here with an additional packet on your table and the remote member should have received an email from ms pero with the attachments so you can refer to the updated information the first item is the telephone system and the district's funding system currently is no longer supported um and has been on the capital plan for replacement however we've had a few items start to fail and the state is also offering another round of security grant funding and the phone system

088is a qualifying qualifying item so we had gone out to bid for a phone system and we had 19 vendors attend a mandatory pre-bid meeting and 15 vendors submitted proposals i'd like to thank mr keller and mr derosa for probably two solid days of reviewing bids and rearranging their schedules in order to get this information uh thoroughly reviewed to make a recommendation to the administration uh to bring forward tonight um that choice is uh for an uh on-premise system not a cloud-based system that was one of the options to be considered we are asking to award the bid to environmental systems corporation west hartford for a net brand system mr derosa checked references he also uh made phone calls around just about the brand itself to determine which brand we wanted to put in um

089and is competent in recommending uh this neck brand system to put in the price is 159 989 and 45 cents for purchasing the district-wide system and it is eligible for a reimbursement under the security right let's make a motion to accept [Music] mr howard would you like to second thought all right thank you afc have anything to say regarding this i'm now absolutely in favor and i think that uh mr grabbed a good point um in terms of how long is it expected to last well we'll see it's got a great reputation and certainly it was well vetted but it may be um there may be other things in the future that may require a different software application so they were fine with that as it was pointed out the last system was toshiba and

090it lasted five years before they went out of business so nec is a good name brand but who knows right so yes but if you figure the rebates so the 160 goes down to like 75 over three schools over let's say at least five years it's relatively reasonable and we have to have it so well we can still use like cans and strings but we're not going to do that so for safety we have to have it so yeah can i ask a question regarding the rebates how would it function if the money is coming from this current fiscal year but then the rebates arrive i assume not in this fiscal year do they actually get assigned to this fiscal year or will they have to lapse into the next they arrive in the form

091of a grant so they're put into the grant fund and then the district can choose how they use those funds because they are reimbursement for after purchases are made and typically we put them back into the same type of items technology and security so am i correct though it'll probably you're not expecting the grant funds to come in before our june 30th deadline these would arrive in next year's um line item or they would they would uh the grant application is due tomorrow so we don't expect a decision for several months okay so so it's a way of we would spend the entire amount out of this fiscal year but then receive reimbursements into next fiscal year's funds right goes into the grant but not the general operating budget ah i see okay thank you

092thank you mr davis just a couple of questions the recommendation that we have here what was the thing about this particular uh bid that moved it to us that was it the quality of product the price i mean we're getting a recommendation but i haven't seen anything else other than the recommendation yeah and so it was it was uh to say that the long process is probably understating a little bit but so we start basically by the big whiteboard we list out all of the bids that came in based on manufacturer features whether or not it's cloud based on time based and then we literally just pick through each one and do comparisons and we find features that we really do want features that we really don't want which is we can do with or

093without and we start kind of leading them out one by one there were multiple vendors who came in with like so like mitel is a big one might tell i think we had five vendors uh who approached us with michael and so what we do is we take those five as an individual group and we go through those five and see all those five which one makes the most sense and we move that one forward into the column we have two people coming with nbc's did the same thing with them with that four and we kind of wiggled it all the way out but what we ended up with with nec was um a product that has been around for a very long time even longer than toshiba actually um that met all the needs

094in the rfp we had a bunch of them that didn't quite meet the specs in the rfa we decided throughout the process that a cloud-based system and the monthly recurring fees that were associated with that were not going to work for us with this high system that we were looking for we could actually buy an on-prem system at a lower overall cost over five years than the or the recurring fees that we would see with the cloud system so all the cloud systems slowly kind of faded away we had a long pen system with one of the top ones we started calling references um i actually called the glastonbury school system just to ask about nvc in general because they just did an ac system and while he was raving about the nec phones in

095the system he also started raving about the vendor who did the installation and support of them who happens to be the same vendor that we were developing so it kind of all came together and then we looked at cost final um the nec system that we ended up choosing was i think i think it was second second lowest in metal bit requirements and the first lowest was a system that just did not meet our needs of requirements and was the vendor that we had not worked with had no familiarity with and whose references actually didn't actually pertain to the product that they were saying it wasn't phone references it was for um other appliances for firewalls so that went out and we were left with [Music] thank you appreciate that very much of this stuff

096uh great that you guys did that kind of work uh gives me a lot of confidence in the process thank you yes mr brown yes ms cardozo yes ms carlson yes mr davis yes mr dimayo yes ms eichler yes miss hubbard yes mr reed yes miss burke yes mr howard yes mccreven yes dr turner yes thank you the next item is phase three of the parking lot uh at amity high school under facilities uh this is part of the bonding funds and a bid was put out and five contractors bid on the project and prices range from 1.91 per square foot to 75 for paving and then various prices for line striping and prices for curves the overall total project cross range from 192 974 to 279 335 uh we are recommending h l cleaving

097llc from norwalk as they were the low bidder the district has worked with the project manager uh while that person was employed with another company and mr martoni has checked references of hnl paving and projects done by them and is satisfied the budget for paving is 329 000 485 that's remaining from our first phase project uh second phase project and um what we're asking is for the board to not only award the bid to help paving for the back parking lot but along the stadium field but also if after the tent is removed from the rear parking lot and the tent company will pass you know what is there what they when they remove the poles but if we're not satisfied with the condition of that rear parking lot that we can work with this

098vendor to repair that parking lot to a likely condition that it started off this whole year with last year okay would someone like to make a motion to accept that i'll make the motion i'll move to award phase three of the payment payment project daily high school to hnl payment llc of norwalk connecticut for the price of 192 974 with the option of repairing the rear parking lot if needed with remaining paving funds thank you mr reed thank you discussion mr belfanty yes mr brown yes ms cardoza yes ms carlson yes mr davis yeah mr demeo yes miss eichler yes miss hubbard yes mr reed yes mrs burke yes mr howard yes is mccrevin yes turner yes the monthly financial report and that is the second uh document in the revised packet um and the

099difference really is showing that um the difference if you uh approve the purchase of the phone system because that number was not known when uh prepared the package for friday's distribution so the difference in the two reports is the 159 000 for the phone system uh the change month over month was a little change in revenue up and down overall for the year special ed reimbursement came in at 84.4 which is substantially higher than other years we budgeted 73 we see changes in the salary lines and we specifically saw a lot of changes once uh staff became vaccinated uh returned from working remotely and had a significant drop in need for substitutes it's also the time of year that people do tend to be on unpaid legal absences and those funds start to become unencumbered

100the medical for the month was uh under budget and for the year right now is projecting that it will be about 77 percent of budget and approximately 700 000 left in that account special ed transportation and tuition uh as usual fluctuate month to month as to student needs in other purchase services you will see a request for 31 440 to put to the school cafeteria fund if approved that would be the total transfer from the general fund to the cafeteria fund of 106 440. the overall uh loss through may is 112 543. um in the estimate by the end of uh once the numbers are final for juniors about 122 000 um just as an example a la carte sales in a typical year the last full year 2019 were 281 000 and this year

101they were 7 500 so um even though this is a significant request to put money into the funds we did it we're able to offset some of that deficit with uh providing free lunch at a higher uh reimbursement rate to students so you will see that transfer later in the packet the transfers will fully expand the contingency account you will see requests for equipment um as i mentioned in the prior month that we'd be coming forward with those with devices for support staff administrative staff to work remotely and then to buy when we return the lease devices we would like to buy out some devices for stock of parts so we will ask for transfers for the covet accounts we think those expenses are winding down for the year okay um 59 and the most

102recent ones for may are then if you'd like me to go on to the budget transfers over 3000 we have uh basically two sets one is the general operating budget for the capital funds i don't know if um the will of the board before mislimits starts going through these at afc started to take them all as one and uh wisened up to the ability to do that so i don't know if that's something that the board would like to vote to do uh first and then they can explain them um and then entertaining the motion to approve them and then follow that up with questions um but uh i would refer to mr brown as cardozo who were actually at the afc meeting and went through that process that was pretty simple and if we

103could defer to chris you can just repeat his smooth motion do i include the technology this time yes you can please um so i'd like to make a motion to approve the items for the transfers on page 60 of our packet and starting with the technology a through c and then the um security a through d and then three through seven so like two seconds all right mr belfanti yes mr brown yes ms cardozo yes miss carlson mr davis mr dimeo yes miss eichler yes miss howard oh sorry ms hubbard mr reed yes miss burke yes mr howard yes yes turner yes okay so now we're taking them together so now we need a motion to approve all of them you like that motion thank you i think we have a second i'll second okay

104what do we [Music] okay so item 1a and technology is the staff laptops we're working on two different uh bid items uh big consortiums uh 11 devices for administrators that were total 17 787 and 33 devices for support staff to only 27 456. the total transfer request of 45 000. you will see that a good chunk of that comes from within the technology department itself just given like every department operated differently this year so had some funds available and then just under 15 000 coming from contingency to cover that expense if approved the second item is the promethium active boards what we typically call smart boards we currently have two they're not repairable and there are no funds uh in the budget next year to replace any that fail so the request is for four

105prometheans um and that too is also coming from the technology department's budget and transfer between accounts the student devices buyout is for the first lease that's about to expire we'll be returning devices and devices that are not fully functional we'll have to pay the fair market value for we would like to keep those on hand to make a stock of um parts for other devices in-house and for the student help desk that is requested 24 000 coming from a transportation account the phone system i think we just went through that you can see that is actually coming from the medical line and that is the third doc this is the third document from the revised packet by the way that has the amount in there for the phone system key card access each building is

106requesting additional points with the number of times that students are taken outside during the pandemic and it's a practice that the staff would like to continue but they would also feel more comfortable with more access points to come back into the building with their key card badge this all of these security items are eligible for grant funding then we have security facilities uh window film we'd like to continue adding uh window film to the buildings this is also an item that is eligible for grant being reimbursement this would likely finish off all of our areas for window film if this is approved uh and lastly under security is to add a fence on the side field by anthony middle school bethany the field used for many activities and one end of it is uh accessible

107from the road um so we would install fence to increase the safety of field activities this is also eligible um as far as the security grant goes we filed a grant today we requested a total of six hundred and seventy seven thousand nine hundred and forty seven dollars um that puts us in a reimbursement rate uh if everything were approved 235 000 by 15. we're allowed to go back and include all items that were not funded in previous rounds so for example the biggest items that come to mind are the security vestibules at woodridge and bethany middle school were not funded orange was funded in round four so we put in everything that was not funded hopefully we will get credit for those projects and receive some funds um number three is the cafeteria request

108for 31 000 which we went through in the forecast staff development dr mccadden is bringing in a presenter for readers and that is a transfer between her accounts special ed mr brandt is asking for additional protocols and assessments for evaluations and those transfers are between his accounts at bethany dr tracy is requesting to to purchase 25 guitars mini amp stands pick some plugs and this is due to the addition to music to the rounds in the coming school year um orange has enough guitars they may need to order some smaller items but they it will be under three thousand dollars um many of those uh lines are coming from um within the bethany accounts uh and seven is the last one and that is the covet accounts and again just um having tracked expenses all

109year and uh taking money from transportation to cover some of those costs and this is the last of the funds that we had held back from accounts the 15 percent were releasing to cover the this transfer because does anyone have any questions or discuss the dialogue in i just had a question with regard to item six um at the bethany middle school the request is being made what looks like music equipment stands and guitars but i'm just wondering why there's travel conference what that how that is um included there that's where we're taking the money from because it wasn't spent on travel and conferences oh that's coming from that sorry i was unmute it's coming from that account i thought it was an expenditure being listed that's the account it's coming from correct you any

110other questions or comments saying that we can call it mr velvente yes mr brown yes miss cardozo yes miss carlson yes mr davis mr dimeo yes miss eichler yes miss hubbard yes mr reed yes miss burke yes mr howard yes ms mccrevin yes dr turner yes okay that passes thank you i'm finally getting a project report on page 69. um actually we're going to look at um page 66 where we have um some uh projects change orders and budget transfers first okay so let's make a motion i'd like to make a motion to approve the change orders before three change orders and their corresponding um motions or budget transfers for each of those these are for the change orders for the stadium project and for the hvac projects okay so i'd like to start a

111second mr mayo so the first one stadium project change order number four is for the uh additional cost for rented equipment due to the stock work order we had mentioned this last month but it didn't have the change order specific amount at the time of the meeting so that cost is 16 44 45 and 15 um hvac change order one is that the air handler units for the guidance area are too large to fit through the maintenance doorway all trade industries the vendor who did the work to open the wall in the photo class can remove the door frame and a row of cinder block to enlarge the entryway then the entryway will be reconstructed after the units are in the building it's anticipated that the door frame likely might be bent during that process

112and won't be able to be reused although the existing doors will be able to be recalled so the cost for that is 5 800 and then change order two is while the work is being done on the air handling units for the guidance area it will require shutdown of that unit in removal but that unit also serves the technology and media center so out of concern for both the laptops and the books in there and not to mention the technology stack that um the mr martoni looked for a temporary air conditioned solution for that area so that we could preserve those items so the quote is for six thousand three hundred thirty dollars for one month we are anticipating that it will go beyond one month and so we're asking for a total of two

113months to provide temporary air conditioning in those areas mr belfonti yes mr brown yes miss cardozo yes miss carlson yes mr davis mr demayo miss eichler yes miss hubbard yes mr reed yes miss burke i'm an abstain mr howard yes lipstein dr turner yes thank you and then the monthly project report um and really the most significant change was there was a bill for the stadium project um of 972 673 and that's the substantial work that's being done with the attracting accord and the uh field being expected next week um we have a meeting mr howard recently yes we had our um meeting on may 17th and uh please be brutal with the first reads [Music] all right um so the first policy is a new policy for the um board of education for consideration

114uh for 118.22 um the connecticut code of professional responsibility for teachers is essentially the code that was developed by the state of connecticut outlining the expectations for professional responsibilities for teachers oftentimes if i am in the process of having to have a formal disciplinary meeting with an employee i will often reference the code of professional conduct and ways in which the employee has potentially violated that quote however i think it would um add to the conversation to know that the board of education's policy is also in support of the code of professional conduct because then i can not only say that they are violating the code of conduct but that they are also violating board of education policy um it's not frequently that i have to do this but when i do it is much

115more helpful if i have some uh some teeth behind those that those recommendations that i have to make so that i would ask the board to consider this as a new policy and then the second new policy for consideration so on page 73 that is the existing student staff non-modernization policy so that's the current amity policy um and then beginning on page 74 is the newly proposed annuity policy um firstly we want to make it clear that we don't have any issues in this area so that's not why the policy is coming before the board thank you mrs carlson for crossing your fingers um i appreciate that as well but i do think that this policy is a much more robust um and clear policy um i particularly like um the second paragraph where it's

116the responsibility of the administration to review this policy um and it certainly um provides uh much more clarity about student and staff non-practical expectations so that is the second revision that i would consider the on board or i would ask the board to consider and then the last policy which again is a new one is 4118.51 and throughout the course of this year we have certainly had um some instances um with respect to social media and um staff and we do not currently have a policy and slaves for that um this policy was actually developed by the board of education's attorneys because i was very cognizant of the very fine line that you walk between first amendment rights for the staff but then also the use of social media and the portrayal of the school

117district within that social media so i did ask the board's attorney to draft this policy for consideration um i do know that in reviewing other policies from other districts the language is not that different from other districts so i feel that this has probably been vetted not just by the the amity board's attorneys but by several of the board attorneys throughout the state and um i really bring it on to the board tonight as a first read um as mr howard said please be brutal um because it's actually very important to me that this policy is goes to a second read in august so it can be in place at the start of the school year the policy is also accompanied by a regulation that the board's attorney has drafted for us which the uh

118school administration has reviewed and um i have also asked um for input from the aea to see that uh it's something it's a regulation that we can actually work within those parameters uh so um i i this is actually we've been working on this probably for months trying to get this all put together but it would be a new policy for board of education to adopt that is it for first reads yes such a silly thing but judgment stands out as i believe it only has one id it's just a typo somebody can google it to confirm but as i recall judgment only has one need and that's in the social media policy uh yeah that's 4118.51 okay there's a paragraph not a big deal but just don't mention it nope that is fine i

119will have ms caro check that when we are back at work tomorrow thank you on page 74 uh next to last set or last sentence the prohibition extends to students of the opposite sex or the same sex as the staff member it just seems an over burdened way to say it like we would just say any sex or you don't have to say it at all um it could be any just seems it's the opposite sex or the same sex so or any sex or not say it what's that well then you have to go to non-binary so you may actually want to get a good legal definition on that right just a thought i want to strike that whole sentence maybe i don't know that the rest of that sentence is seems a little

120outdated does this also refer to you by illegal um so this was actually um cave provided models of student and they had probably i don't know eight different ways you could say this and so what we did was pick language that seemed most appropriate for i would say a seven through twelve setting right um and kind of drafted the more robust essentially the cave model each individual sentence was a policy in and of itself and so when you combine them all together that's when i felt they could actually make a clear policy when you meet the policy is it just the board in you or is there any other people are there teachers or administrators there i was wondering if for example that might be helpful um sometimes there is if it like particularly like

121social media they don't attend the policy meeting but i forward out the policy to them yeah um even before i oftentimes bring it to the board policy committee because if they know there's something that isn't going to work then um then i can strike that before i even get into policy itself um yes [Music] because it does make it clear i guess we have a reference in the connecticut statues at the bottom for sexual assault in the second degree as a class c or b felony nowhere else in the policy are we saying it's not just on i think we're saying it's unethical and unacceptable but the description here would encompass things that are actually illegal as well i don't know if we should say that or we need to say that obviously we're not

122going to have illegal behavior taking place and then there's no such thing as reciprocal illegal crimes you know like that's it's seems odd the way it's phrased so i would just encourage more word word smithing of the whole policy you're referring to is based on age right so if the person was the student was 18 there wouldn't be a legal issue uh no there would be because of the they have to be out of school correct yeah because of the relationship between the teacher and the students so even if the student was a legal age if they were still a student here it would still be it would still fall under a so if it's illegal do we still need a policy if every situation has already been doing so i think i understand we

123don't currently have a policy is that right it's on page 73. ah sorry and i think that one of the differences is that this also covers nuanced behavior yeah so that is correct so it can cover things like grooming which maybe is not something that is necessarily going to have a legal ramification but it could certainly right but we don't actually say we don't use the phrase grooming right so i mean if we're going to be clear we should be very clear otherwise the existing policy i i don't know has has the legal team told us the existing policy is not enough and it needs to be or are we just looking for ways to strengthen the message uh so i was looking for ways to strengthen the uh message have just an attorney over

124in other words to strengthen it to expand it because honestly it's just three lines it does seem that it does deserve much more attention than just three lines but i would just want us to be protected well and so i would ask the board we do pay for cave policy services which is controlled by attorneys who work for cave and these were their recommendations is it the will of the board that we continue to use cave or do we extend to the board's attorneys around this particular policy question but not i mean i just feel like an attorney should make sure that this is really okay that that we've covered enough because we like in other words just to say exactly what it is we'd like to have this more fleshed out than our previous

125policy how does this look to you i don't care whether it's king or a personal injury this is first read so i think the policy we can you know discuss this at our next meeting because this is the benefit of first week so thank you all for your input got it are you guys having a meeting in july or is it going to be june right george did you have them we have one on june 21st at 5 30. we're now just a quick comment on both that policy and the next one on social media i i would really encourage someone to take a look at our uh three sending districts and their policy language as well because um i think that there's a pretty detailed social media policy at woodbridge i know for sure

126um but you might want to take a look at those because they were vetted through policy services etc there as well well and it's convenient because woodbridge is the same attorney that we do so i would assume that again the language looks very similar it could be that i'm thinking of the um the underlying procedure underneath it but there's there is a whole bunch of detail detail usually means regulation but we can check just a comment for the policy committee line item number five on page 75 harms the goodwill and replication of arsd yeah i have a question about that one too that was a little vague for me that seems a little troublesome that's an opinion type situation exactly it's hard yeah i mean being a pats fan might be you know take it

127into consideration first three thank you all right so up for second read um the first is four one one one sorry too many ones four one one five uh and this is a revision to our evaluation and support program which is aligned to essentially the statutory requirements of the teacher evaluation process and for the most part most of this is following a it's already an existing practice because we were required to implement um our teacher evaluation uh system in the manner that we have uh much of it is statutory language although it has been cross-referenced in a couple of places where we do have some discretion with our current amity teacher evaluation plan that the board of education has approved so this is now bringing our eval and support policy up to date and then

128um again just a reminder for 117.4 um we had this as an existing policy but we um clarify the difference between non-tenured teachers and ten-year teachers which statutorily are different and then added some language with respect to to suspension [Music] i have a question on page 82 for this policy and i apologize for not noticing it before uh reason d for someone being terminated is disability as shown by competent medical evidence and that language just seems to me to be unduly harsh and i imagine that what is meant is disability that renders one unable to teach competently right okay if we're stuck we're stuck but i don't like it i don't think it builds a community of people feeling safe and welcome so um i i will assure you that that um that those categories

129are straight from the teacher tenure law okay thank you all right and then um policy four one one seven point four one um again it's a new policy um this is the the concept of progressive development and how it is applied is something that we do in practice in entity but it is not actually codified in a policy um and it would be my recommendation just in terms of helping everybody understand what expectations are with respect to discipline that is codified into this recommended policy um and then 4118.11 again as a reminder it's an existing policy everything in here is currently what we have with the exception of paragraph 2 on eeo which our current policy lacks and i thought likely that it was lacking and it should be added so that was not a

130cave recommendation per se we could continue with our existing policy but i did use the cave model and add the eeo statement which was one of the things that was missing in ours that was in the cave model so that's it mr chair you know going back to 12 years of sitting through policy can i just commend the policy committee for actually making progress you guys have made so much progress compared to when we first started this i can't thank you enough i think it's amazing we were so far behind i can't remember how many years we were we were sort of in violence and i believe the great leadership of george howard it's all miss perro it's all miss pero she's been very helpful in streamlining the whole process thanks for saying yes mr

131brown yes miss cardozo yes ms carlson yes mr davis mr dimeo yes miss eichler yes miss hubbard yes mr reed yes miss burke yes howard yes yes dr turner yes okay so we can take them as one and we need a motion to accept i'll make him just read do we have a second a second i'm charleston thank you any further discussion mr brown yes ms cardozo yes miss carlson yes mr davis yes mr demayo yes miss eichler yes miss hubbard mr reed yes miss burke yes howard yes kevin yes dr turner yes okay thank you so those four policies all passed thank you um moving on to personnel um at this point you know we have completed our negotiations with the para educators um and so we are just waiting for them to ratify

132their contract and then um i will hopefully be able to maybe have a nice quick zoom personnel committee meeting so that we can bring it to the board of education for approval at the august meeting um i will say it was a remarkably pleasant negotiation and um and miss loomis and i i think are and mr brandt are very pleased with the um the outcome of how we've structured their contract and particularly with their salaries so i'm kind of excited to share it with the board once we finally get a chance to do that um the nurses on negotiations we have not even scheduled to start yet so we will be a year behind on their contract but um four contracts in one year along with as mr down hour referenced all the moas that's

133plenty so it's fine if we don't start until the summer time great okay um new business um just a reminder to the board uh this wednesday we have uh our superintendent evaluation meeting uh that will be a zoom meeting and materials will be going out to board members tomorrow regarding that to help you prepare for it and wednesday on the 30th that is our board self-evaluation that will be in person and we look forward to sharing information there and learning a little more about the board and how we can best serve the public uh any other new business mr president probably not new business but uh it was a question for dr buyers i'm related to summer school i know things are changing uh with the funding and what the programs are uh but i

134i've gotten some questions asked me what's going on with summer school uh so just kind of relaying that to you what what's dates times places or who's being covered those types of things so we have opened up um essentially um summer schools uh programs for students who are currently in sixth grade so rising seventh graders rising eighth graders and rising ninth graders and those are essentially our middle school summer programs um they are going to be held from july 6 through july 29th monday through thursday from 8 a.m to 12 p.m um they were chosen that time was chosen specifically because it's concurrent to the extended school year program for special education students so it means mr brant and i are able to share transportation costs and we can provide transportation for all of those

135students um the students who were chosen for this program were recommended based on their teacher recommendations as well as counselors for students who could use a little bit of a boost to close learning gaps and prepare them for the start of the school year we offered 40 slots for our amity middle school students so basically 20 per grade level 10 from each school and we offered 15 slots to the orange elementary they could figure out who what school could send kids 10 slots to beecher road and 5 to bethany i would say at this point we are maybe filled to 50 capacity um and have gone on to the second and sort of third tier students um so we're hearing from a lot of parents that their kids are tired that they appreciate the offer

136but they would really just like some time off and away from school so we've really been struggling to actually fill the programs um but we will still run them as planned and offer instruction for those students in english language arts math and science um the high school will be running a credit recovery program that will require both um some online learning from students as well as in-person attendance that is actually scheduled to start june 22nd so mrs laplante and her counseling department have been identifying all of the students who are in need of credits for credit recovery so that they can still be focused on in-time graduation that is an eight-week program and the in-person supports will be offered on tuesdays wednesdays and thursdays from 10 a.m until 12 noon and so that is going

137to be run through edgysteer which is an online credit recovery system it would have been the same program that would have been offered by aces but because we're using grant funding we can run it and parents do not have to pay for attendance in that program concurrent to all of this the high school counseling staff is offering a sort of re-engagement summer program so for those students who maybe didn't have academic difficulties although ironically some of them seem to be overlapping uh but students who really were just disengaged chronically absent unable to keep up with the work and manage the the sort of time on task throughout the course of this year and so they will offer and it's it's not content-based it's not academic it's strictly group counseling to help those students acclimate coming

138back to school and that will run throughout the summer partnered with some of these credit recovery programs but then have a fairly intensive session in sort of the week right before school um so that we can have those students feel like they have the skills and the resources to come back into the buildings and to re-engage in learning so that's where we currently are for our summer programs are all the programs going to be held at the high school yes they are originally we had intended to try to have the rising seventh graders at the middle schools um but because of the numbers it wasn't feasible to run two programs and then once we moved them to value school we could provide transportation we were hoping that would actually increase our enrollment um which maybe

139it has by one or two kids thank you very much you're welcome any other items um items for the next agenda please get me by july 31st all right there we go