001Oh, our mics. Yeah. Everybody's blue light on. Hi everyone. Good evening. Welcome to the Shelton Board of Education regular meeting. It is Wednesday, April 23rd, 700 p.m. We're going to call the meeting to order. Can I get a roll call, please? Amy Romano here. Jim Fen here. Joan Littlefield here. Patricia Mooden here. Anthony Sparino here. Kate Coutach here. Lorraine Rosner here. Jason Nav here. James Zorzetti is absent. Also in attendance, Dr. Ken Serinich, Jacqueline Tulings, Glenn Newman, Kristen Santilli, Tracy Hussy, and Axida Upi. Okay, if we could all please stand for the pledge of allegiance. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Hey, can I get a motion to approve the agenda?
002Second. Oh, fast tonight. I know. Look at that. We want to get through it. We'll start over. Can I get a motion to approve the agenda? Okay. Motion made by Koutach, second by Mr. Fhan. All in favor? Okay. Moving on. Item number three. Can I get a motion to approve the consent agenda, please? Move. Second. Okay. All in favor? I. Okay. Moving on to item number four, presentations and recognitions. We have two items this evening. We are going to start with the CABE student leadership awards. Dr. Sarah. Thank you, Madam Chair. So every year as members of CABE, which is um the organization that our board of education is a part of, um they they ask us to recognize two high school students and two of our middle school students um that show exemplary leadership
003um skills at their at their level um and their involvement in the schools. So, we usually ask our schools who know our students the best, um, our principles to recognize those two students and they provide the names to our office and we we send those names into CABE. The I we just inquired today, Sharon and I inquired today that Cab will be sending um a certificate recognition to the students. It hasn't been sent out as of yet, but it's in the mail. But we'd like to recognize them tonight. And I'd like to turn it over to our principles of Shelton Intermediate School and Shelton High School to present our CE award winners. Good evening. Good evening. You're going to Mr. Cooterelli, you're going to get a mic just so we can hear you on the
004tape. [Music] All right. For some of you out there, I'm Mr. Coutelli, Doug Petrell, the principal in SAS. I'd like to invite our two uh award recipients, our cable award recipients up. Redeema Mahante and Anastasia Bracha Kovska. Can I get it? So, I'm just going to read something that was uh submitted by um some of our staff members at SIS. Redeema has been an important part of the SIS community since her first day here. She started at the student council club at 7th grade and was elected to be our president in 8th grade. She has used her voice to help implement many of the students class ideas into our schools including our competition, team decorating contest, fundraisers such as candy king grams, Valentine's Day roses. She does all this while getting up early and going
005to her geometry class at your school there, Miss uh Miss Riddle. Um, outside of school, she regularly assists the community by instructing younger children in piano and dance lessons, regularly donating local charities, and taking part in community park and bench cleanups. She is amazing role model for her peers and an amazing student at Shelton at Shelton Intermediate School. Congratulations. Anastasia is also our student who is very uh involved in our school. She has been the member of our SIS student council since seventh grade. As an eighth grader, she is our student council secretary. She is responsible for keeping track of all of our meeting minutes, including uh recording attendance, keeping notes for each of the meetings as well as starting the meeting and the agenda each day. She plays a huge role in keeping us
006within the budget in the activities such as uh the winter carnival, the eighth grade dance. Anastasia is also an active member of our SIS drama club, regularly staying after school to attend rehearsals and contributing to our musical performances. So, we want to thank and uh both of these students for their contributions to Shelton Intermediate School as well as our community. Um they are wonderful role models and they have bright futures ahead of them as they move towards their high school career. So, congratulations Ready? Drop the mic. Drop the mic. [Music] Right. Good evening everyone. My name is Kathy Riddle. I'm a proud principal of Shelton High School and I'm pleased to introduce our two Connecticut Association of Board of Education award recipients, Mr. Talon Harris and the Shrea Yada. If you please join me up
007here first, I'll talk about Talon. Talon is an incredible student athlete. He's worked his way through our entire program of studies to maximize his learning particularly in the STEM fields. Um, in addition to his incredible academic performance, um, you might recognize Kalen from the football field, but not as a player. He's actually our drum major in our marching band and he's an incredible saxophone player. He also volunteers and participates in many of our community service events to help our band program grow. He's also our president of our health occupations club, one of our student ambassadors, and is a state qualifier in our track and field teams. He was also the recipient of our president's volunteer service award. And even though he does all that, he also works part-time at Chick-fil-A. So, I'm not telling you,
008but I like that they pl for Chick-fil-A. I understand. Um, the one thing about Talon is he's not only an incredible student, but he's just an wonderful human being. I hope he'll smile for you because he has the most fantastic smile. He brightens my day every day. Uh, he's such a fine representative, which what Shelton High School is. Um, and we are so proud of them. Talent ranks in the top 10 of our graduating class this year, and he will attend Yukon in the fall to study chemical engineering. Congratulations, Talent. Our next recipient is Miss Shread, who I have known for years and years through the Lego League all the way up. So, it's been fun growing up with you. Um, she's an exemplary student whose dedication to academics, leadership, and service. Uh, it this
009makes her certainly a deserving recipient of our CABE award. She is a committed member of our Shelton High School student council. our DECA and is very active in our robotics team which just came back from the national tournament who did very well. We're very proud of them. Shrea has demonstrated invaluable leadership and teamwork skills. She has a passion for STEM. Um she's one of those people that love engineering, physics, and just has to figure out how things work. So, she's going to be incredibly successful in life. Um, the one thing that's just so unique about Shrea is she's so quiet and unassuming, which goes along with I know many of you in this room saw Mama Mia, right? And so, Mama Mia, everyone that gets the praise that's on the stage, Shrea is the one
010behind the scenes doing it all. So, we thank her so much for that. So even though Sherea will not get the spotlight, I can't un officially announce it till May 1st, but she is our Val Victorian of the West. She plans to study physics at either Yukon or Carnegie Melon. So yet to be determined, but congratulations, Shrea. You guys want to get in front of those? Those are awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, you nice. Congratulations to the parents as well. I can see the letters. We we have a second presentation that we're going to do this evening as well. Another recognition. Um as as we all know, we're very proud of our teachers here in the Shelter Public School System. I always say that we have the bests that go above and beyond in
011in the amazing work they do with our children every day. And as part of one one aspect of of the recognition we provide our teachers is the teacher of the year process. Um the best thing about that process is um teach it's it's teacher driven. The nominations come from their peers. So it's the peers recognizing their peers. Um and then the panel in which the teacher of the year is selected is done by a panel of peers. It has nothing to do with an evaluation process. Administration's involvement in the process whatsoever is just to make sure that the teacher is qualified in terms of are they tenured and just have the basic qualifications that the state of Connecticut requires. Um, I'm happy to announce that we have three our three finalists for the teacher year
012year um process uh that we're going to recognize this evening. Um, by the this time at our next board of ed meeting, we should be able to announce who our teacher of the year is. Um, but I would like to um recognize our finalists as they will go in front of the panel of their peers and do a presentation for them um in the expectations and hopes uh of be being selected as the teacher of the year for Shelton. So, I know one of them could not be with us tonight. Um, so I'll just mention her by name, but our first nominee is Jordana Pinto from Shelton Intermediate School. Our second finalist is Nick Msina from Boothill School. Nick, can you please join us up here? [Applause] And last but not le least of the
013finalists is Angela Cau from Shelton High School. Angela, please join us. Uh the the best thing about my tenure here in Shelton going on the number of years I've been here is um the relationships that you make with the staff over time. And I'm happy that um to say that I've known these two individuals for quite some time here in this school system. I know the quality of their work as well as Jordana who's not here with us tonight and I'm very proud of all three of them and they are fine candidates for this position for teacher of the year and we'll find out in a month's time of how it works out. So congratulations to the two of you. Please join me in the middle. We're going to take a little picture for social
014media for the two of you. But um well done at making it this far in the process. So congratulations from the fire. Yeah. Oh, they're good. Yeah. I know my nephew sir. Yeah, you got to go high and low. High and low. And luckily there still be sometimes go down like this. I don't know. And Madam Chair, that's all for our presentation. Congratulations everyone. All right, moving on to the student board of education representatives report. Hi. Hi. So, um the robotics team went to Houston for their world championship uh last week during April break. Also, band and color guard went to Canada to perform. Um, our peer-to-p peer tutoring ended a couple weeks ago and spring sports are started and they are going really well. Um, boys and girls state have been announced and seniors
015have started delivering their capstone presentations. Tomorrow, juniors are taking NGSS and freshman and sophomores have their class selections. Uh, MMA Mia was a couple weeks ago. It went very well and we had a very good outcome. Uh, April 28th to May 2nd is college and career citizenship week and AP exams for the first two weeks of May. Um, and May 1st is senior's decision day and May 10th is prom. Are we doing something for senior decision day on May 1st? Kathy, I need to be warned for that. It's next week. Oh my gosh. What day is May 1st? What was that? What did she say? She said, "Check your email. Check my email. Check my email. Actually, you know what? You're cuz they said that because other moms were mentioning too. They're like, "Didn't Kathy
016send something out?" Us senior parents are getting a little overwhelmed. No excuse, but you get a little busy. The bus. Okay. It doesn't matter. But other moms were asking me as well and they're like, "We have to decorate the doors or something." I'm like, "Oh god, it's next week." All right. Well, we got to do that then. That's exciting. Sounds like a lot is going on at the high school. Sounds good. Thank you very much. Oh, it's the long and I'll just uh reference it so the board has an understanding. So, every year we're required by the state statute, the board has to pass this very long wordy motion. Um, we're required to have it reflected in the minutes about our compliance with the requirements in the state lunch program. If we did not do
017this motion, we would not be eligible for the reimbursement on um the free free meals. So, this obviously is something that we want to do. Our cafeteria is in full compliance with all the healthy and nutrition aspects. Um so, it's just really a process that the board needs to go through so we can submit it to the state. Okay. I'm going to read the long approval and then I will ask someone to second and we will vote on it. All right. Ready? That's pretty long. Approval of the healthy food certification statement for school year 2025 to 2026. Pursuant to CGS section 10-215F, the Shelton Board of Education certifies that all food items offered for sale to students in the schools under its juris juris I can't even talk anymore. Sorry about that. Jurisdiction and not
018exempted from the Connecticut nutritional standards published by the Connecticut State Department of Education will comply with the Connecticut Nutritional Standards during the period of July 1, 2025 through June 30th, 2026. This certification shall include all food offered to for sale to students separately from reimburseable meals at all times and from all sources including but not limited to school stores, vending machines, school cafeterias, culinary programs. Flip flip and fundraising activities on school premises sponsored by the school or non-school organization and groups. motion language for combined food and beverage exemptions. The Shelton Board of Education won't allow the sale of to students of food items that do not meet the Connecticut nutritional standards and beverages not listed in section 10-221Q of the Connecticut General Statutes provided that the following conditions are met. One, the sale is in
019connection with an event occurring after the end of regular school day or the weekend. Two, the sale is at the location of the event. Three, the food and beverage items are not sold from a vending machine or school store. An event is an occurrence that involves more than just a regular scheduled practice meeting or extracurricular activity. For example, soccer games, school plays, and intercolastical debates are events, but soccer practices, play rehearsals, and debate teams meetings are not. The regular school day is the period from midnight before to 30 minutes after the end of the official school day. Location means where the event is being held and must be the same place as the food and beverages fails. I get a second. Second. All in favor? I. Nice job, Amy. Motion carries. Now we can continue
020to sell hot dogs at the max. I'm shocked I only had one typo in one mess up something in there. The long one. Okay. Public comment. Here I go again. Per board policy 9323 and 9325. 5 minutes is allotted to each speaker. No board of ed employee, student or community man member shall be defamed within public comment. Any members of the public who wish to speak briefly before the board must only comment on matters associated with board of education business. Persons wishing to address the Shelton Board of Education are limited to Shelton residents, parents of current Shelton students and employees of Shelton public schools or service contracted providers of Shelton public schools. There anyone here that would like to sign up? Say it face one more time. Is there anyone here that would like to
021speak? Is there anyone that would like to speak? Okay. item this statement sign up at sign. They have to read that and acknowledge it rather than every heavy policy sign they require signing acknowledging I'd be happy to look into if we if if that is compliance if we if it has to be read out loud or we could just have them sign off. I'll just check with legal. Okay. Research. Sure. Sometimes we do have people speak like offer or with Right. Okay. Okay. Well, no one's here. We will definitely look into that. I agree. Okay. Let's see. Moving on to item number eight. Reports of standing committees. Teaching and learning committee did not meet this past month. Okay. Finance Committee. Uh, Mr. Orizetti is not here, but would anybody up Mr. Smolino, did you want
022to say anything? I know we just met. So, yeah, we just met and also right before that we met met with a athletics trying to work out things. So, uh, it'll enhance students, players, and things of that nature. Um, and we're excited to uh work with Scott Tenant and we're looking forward to it. We're going to come up with a plan and uh hopefully we'll implement that plan. Perfect item C policy committee. Yes, Madam Chair. we met uh moving forward uh policy for our 1341 fundraising uh also want to mention uh all the work on this greatly appreciated because left over and went through it again and then I believe work with you as well madam chairman I wanted to say thank you a fun time was had by all you guys doing a policy
023and sip like they have uh yes and so now the policy will sit for the next regular scheduled. Yes. Thank you. Thank you very I have one. I'd like to make a motion that we uh approve it and uh for review and then next regular. Okay. Buildings and grounds. Oh, do we need No, I don't think we need a motion to No, cuz you're going to vote on it next. to vote on an acknowledging that it's sitting perfect. Thank you for the next meeting. Buildings and grounds met last month. Uh got clarification today actually today about the uh the Moheaggan roof. Uh that's our biggest project here. We're still shooting for this summer to to go ahead and uh start that project. Uh that's still in the hands of the state. We're waiting on a
024project number and then from there we will uh go in and get uh start and then start the bid process. Um and then have the building our town building committee just review some plans. Um so they're thinking about 3 to four weeks um from when that starts. So again goal is for the summer months uh you know when school's out to start the start the roof. Uh we did over over uh April break uh we were able to uh shut down the ESS uh power to transfer the power lines over to some uh two new poles. So that was a positive when when school was out. And that's it. We're going to keep moving along and put pressure on the state for uh you know getting getting our project number and try to get that
025big project project in the works. So that's going to be it. Hopefully next month we'll have more. Keeping our fingers crossed. Reports of liaison. Keep the buckets moving. Yeah. Is there any rain in the forecast? J. I think it's supposed to be a nice since I was principal. I think it's going to be a nice next two months there. There'll be no rain. The buckets. I'm praying for no rain. Reports of liaison. CESTA. Yes. Uh CES representative council met on Thursday, April 3rd. Best will again conduct a summer program for academic recovery for students at the 6th to 6th district magnet school in grades 1 through 4 funded by a grant. RCA, the regional center for the arts, will host a summer program called a taste of RCA for students entering grade 8. This would
026be good for students from our seventh grade going to eighth grade. The program will run four weeks in July and cost $200. It is aimed at letting prospective students explore all five areas offered at RCA: dance, music, acting, musical theater, and film making during the first two weeks and then they pick one to focus on during the final two weeks of the program. RCA had 225 applicants for next year and 80 were invited to attend. With those um entries, the school will be at full capacity for of 235 for the next school year. And this is up from an enrollment postco of 145 in 2021. It's almost up 100. That's meant with Anthem and Sigma to explore new insurance when Connecticut came in at 33% higher than current rates. As I mentioned last month, state
027program was 30% higher while signal was 5% anthem 6%. So that they're considering between those is applying for a risk magnet school capital grant in the amount of $1.5 million to fund needed projects at RCA in six to six. If not granted, the projects will be scaled back, prioritized, and completed out of the contingency fund. A program on anti-semitism professional learning was offered and over 20 school leaders were in attendance. It was developed to help districts ensure that families, students, and staff have a supportive and safe learning environment. Enrollment for the regional center for early learning, prek, is open with some spaces available for this spring, summer, and fall. Interested families are invited to call for a tour. Remember that the program is now open to families throughout the CES region of Fairfield County. Multiple
028professional learning opportunities continue to be offered particularly in play-based learning and teachers are encouraged to consult CES website for further information. Uh CES representative council will meet again in May and then again in June and that will be for that information. Gabe Yeah. Um, there's an update webinar coming up on Monday regarding the appropriations committee budget proposal and actions of the select committee on special education. And that'll be from 12 to 1:15 um on Monday, April 28th via webinar. So, you can just sign in on CAV and register and it might be pretty interesting for us. Um and then just another reminder that um if we'd like to showcase student talent at the AE um PAPSS convention in November, Friday, Saturday, students are going to be performing Friday morning, Saturday morning. And so talent can
029be um proposed to cave or they can be entered into the form. The deadline's May 30th. I'm not performing. That's it. Perfect. Thank you. That special ed one might be interesting for us to log on Monday. Okay. Uh superintendent report. Thank you, Madam Chair. As I said in the finance committee meeting, we are obviously in the throws of the budget process with the city. Um just hours ago, the board of alderman, we received the board of alderman schedule for their workshops. Um, I sent an email to the board members few hours ago as well as administration. Um, of the dates, the most notable dates, um, is Tuesday, May 13th is when the board of alderman will have their public hearing at city hall at 7:00 p.m. Um, this is an opportunity for the public to
030to show support um towards our budget. Um I ask those members of of the public who have thoughts um regarding the budget process or the board of eds particularly and want to show support towards the board of ed that in that process of shorting the support for the board of ed. I think we really need to acknowledge the board of alderman for their help last year. You know last year they really came through by setting up the reserve account. they added extra costs to the to the budget and going to the microphone to say, you know, continue supporting the board of ed versus some of the past decisions of past boards, I think is a really positive approach that we can have as we collaboratively work on this budget process together. And then they also
031published their last meeting um Thursday, May 22nd at 5:30 p.m. is when they will set the mill rate and the budget. Um I of course will put this in my monthly communication that I send out to the community. Um when I do that at the first the first day of the month in May um I ask administrators and of course our board members to share these dates um with whomever they think should be a part of this process so voices can be um as I said earlier you know our district um is in statewide testing right now particularly grades 3 through eight are are engaged in that statewide testing um I'm very proud of the performance of our staff and students and I look forward to the results because I'm sure they will shine. Um,
032as I have always said, um, since I've been in this position for the month of, uh, April, I like to remind everyone that the month of April is autism awareness month. And as a very proud parent of a son with autism, I just want to remind everyone to always be kind. People are different for all different reasons, and showing kindness in this world just helps accept people for who they are. Um, and last but not least, it's very appropriate on this day that the board joined me in recognizing our administrative assistant on administrative assistance day and we publicly recognize her for the work that she does for the board and administrators uh and for all administrative assistants in our district. Thank you for the work that you do on today's That's it much. All right.
033Comments by the board chair. That's me. Um, I wanted to, um, let everyone know, I know that obviously we were here, but for the public, we did go and meet with the board of ENT, um, before April break. It was a very long session. It was 3 hours or a couple two and a half hours. Um, it was a very thorough, you know, um, budget presentation. We did do a hard stop because it was getting very late. Um, they asked a lot of questions. We do have um the information that is going back to them on all the questions um tomorrow. They are asking for us to return again. Um I I don't know what's left of the presentation. I was hoping that we got through all the questions. I will try to get some
034type of format or agenda on what that is going to look like for Monday evening. I know that mo a lot of the board members were there and you know they're they are going to need to make their recommendation to the alderman on the 30th. So um we will go back on Monday. Let's get through the final things that they want to discuss with us. Stay positive and hopefully they um you know it moves in our favor to fund our reserve accounts because obviously those were flatlined and you know get us our obligations that we need. So let's hope that um the two meetings and all the long hours that we are doing with them, you know, it is um beneficial hopefully in the end. So I just want to say stay positive. I know
035that Jackie was there for a long time, Dr. Zerich, we were all there. So I appreciate the time that you're taking away from family to help us get through this budget process. Um and I would like to reiterate what you know, uh Dr. Sinage said the alderman are definitely um you know really helped us out last year. It it was and what he said about public comment I think will go a long ways because for years there's always been a lot of controversy and then people are up there yelling and um getting angry which we all get. we get, but by, you know, maybe turning and going into a better positive direction, thanking them for last year, you know, asking them to still look at our our needs again this year for anyone that's looking
036to speak in the public. I agree with that um stance and hopefully um we can move forward in that right direction. I know that, you know, we have created a good working relationship with them. I know that um the the teachers union has I know that they're even they even speak to the alderman. So, you know, we like that relationship and let's move forward positive in the next um less than 30 days for them to make a decision. So, let's all stay positive and that is about it for me. Okay, moving on. Celebrations. Does anyone have anything? Sure. Um I'd like to congratulate you on behalf like to uh for your recent election last night. More importantly, I I wanted to thank you uh being first a positive campaign uh not a negative campaign in
037today's politics where both sides ripping at each other uh that you conducted yourself as a board chair quite well and I as well as the other opponent did as well. Um it was nice to see and congratulations on your election. Very proud to see someone run and win. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Jim. And I am planning on taking my education fight to Hartford. I will promise you that. I promise you that. I will I will do what I can to get Shelton more special education money. You know that I know what we need and I will definitely be that advocate for Shelton. So, thank you everyone. Well, I' I'd like to also mention that Kout Dash had her first grandchild. Yeah. Kate is now known as Mimi. That's right. We call you. Yeah.
038Yeah. That's her favorite. That's her favorite name now. Mimi. Mimi. Yeah. I love it. She is beautiful. She's wonderful. Yeah, she is. Absolutely. Anyone else? Any more celebrations? Okay. Well, if that is it, I'll make motion. Okay. Second. Second. All in favor? I Okay. So, what do we what I mean?