001Okay, good to go. Okay, we are now live. So, welcome to the summers board of education meeting and would you please rise for the pledge of allegiance. I 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. I'm going to turn it over to you. Thank you and good evening everyone. You never know what you're going to get when you come to a board of ed meeting. Um, to that end, um, I'd like to formally recognize and thank, um, Molly and George and their handlers for their dedicated service and support to our students here in the district. So, we wanted to formally present them with some gift bags. And also, Mrs. Stokes, uh, if you
002would say a couple words about Molly and George and So that's okay. We do this, right? So back when we came back from CO, um Matt Maluso actually contacted Tales of Joy um to see if we could get therapy dogs in to help students um deal with everyone coming back together and and some of the stress that that was causing. And we started out in the collab um at opposite ends of the room with five people at a time and I looked like a waitress from Red Robins. Um that first year we would have 180 people cycle out every week to see the dogs. And I had like they had a five minute timer. They had masks on. There was five people per dog. Um and it just it was so special. until they came
003back the next year and after a while we had some other dogs to start with and then um Carol and Don just decided to take over everything and became a part of um our our everyday Wednesday at SHS and it was truly amazing. And um you can like tell stress levels in the building by how many kids stop by to see the dogs. Um some come because they just need to sit and pet quietly and that's what they need. Others come because They want to share what's happened during their week with Don and Carol. Um, not even as much about the dog, just because they wanted they they tell them the good stuff and the bad stuff that has happened. And Sarah and I will have they'll they'll stop by and ask us, are the
004dogs coming this week? Um, and they have every almost every Wednesday for the past five years. Um, that's been part of our our afternoon. And so it's been amazing. Um, and I know I know they're older and it's time to retire. Um, they had their graduation last year, so we got them for a PG year. Um, some grads here, some super seniors going. Um, but we appreciate everything that you guys have done for us at school and we are so you guys, I just need to say something. If it hadn't been for I probably would have missed out on one of the best things I've ever done because I live in Brandy. I almost didn't come because it's quite a ride. I would have missed it for anything. And Don and I just decided that
005summer's high school. We took over so that nobody could sign. Matt had a sign up online and we just filled in the blanks and that's how it started. That's how it ended. But the kids, I have to say, are the most grateful, kind, compassionate group I've come across in a very long time. They're great kids. And while some of them have challenges and some of them don't, they never fail. Just be kind to the dogs. And they tell us stories that their parents probably wish they didn't. I know they do in kindergarten, but they still do high school. So, it's been our pleasure. Certainly one of you. I told her she was speaking for how old George is 10 and a half. George is 10 and a half and is 13 and a half. Wow.
006So, she's done. But they'll they'll be missing each other because they they um do lay together um as therapy dogs. They're not supposed to be together, but they just sit together now and that it's just the routine. So, yeah, it just works out better for the kids if they were closer together because they were bound to see each other anyway. They bound to be together and he lays on her blanket. Thank you. have a small token of appreciation. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. It was my pleasure. Oh, look, a plant. Um, Don is going to be amazing and she's going to send me pictures of it of like how it blossoms and just a matter of how long it takes. And there's treats for them, too. That's nice. Thank you
007so much. You're welcome. I always say you're welcome to stay, but feel free when she said 7 o'clock, we were like, "Oh boy, this should be interesting at seven." But again, thank you so much. Oh, you're welcome. All right. So, moving on. We need a motion to approve the minutes on May 27th from Shane and a second from JT. Questions, comments? All those in favor of May 27th. Okay. And that's seven and abstensions two. So 702. All right. I'll turn it back to you. Great. Thank you. So, I'll start my update with uh Capstone. I would like to mention uh one student in particular, Stephanie Bzinski, who's going to Yukon next year. And I'm mentioning her because she was um Mrs. Ericson, who's our STEM coach at the elementary level, was her mentor for this
008program. And Stephanie's uh project revolved around women in STEM. So, I I wanted to give Stephanie a nice shout out for the time she spent uh mentoring students at SCES at the elementary school and our own staff members in supporting that effort. Uh to that end, uh you're going to hear from Justin and Theo uh shortly from the high school and I've already had conversations with them about going down to the elementary school to the middle school to work with our students and I think my memory serves me correctly. Justin, you said at age five, you knew you wanted to be an engineer, right? So, right at SCES for right now, there are students who are starting to figure out that they either like something a lot or that they're really good at something. So,
009and just trying to bridge that gap with our high school students down to our elementary, middle school students, accountant on both of you for next year. Uh, moving on, the Lieutenant Governor's Computing Challenge. I wanted to mention that several grade four classes participated in this annual event. And on Friday, May 30th, uh we had the following students were recognized at Quinnipak University for their project of Save a Critter Pickup Litter. And that's Dante Nves, Sawya Picausski, Maggie Heints, Angela Jones. And there were over 900 students in Connecticut who participated in this challenge. Our students were four of the 50 who were recognized at the event. Another congratulations goes out to Matt Doma who's a seventh grader. He was a runner up in the National Great History Challenge which was held in Orlando, Florida over Memorial
010Day weekend. He did very well there. And also another congratulations goes out to Nathan Sedan Demi who made it to the 10th round of the National Spelling Bee. He finished number 19 in the country. I think what's amazing uh about what I'm mentioning so far, it's such a small town and community. Um I can't get away from sports, but we're punching way above our weight class when when kids are being recognized nationally for things. So, I just wanted to let you know that. And as I start to wind down, I got a note from our art teacher, Kyle Kipper. He's an art teacher at the high school and he had his students engage with this project that was connected to Bradley International Airport. If you've ever been up there, they have aderondac chairs out in
011the main lobby. So, the project is um several high schools will paint those uh chairs and if they come out really well, they get displayed. So, in your red folders, you'll see a picture of one of the chairs that they completed. So, if you're flying out this weekend or this summer, you know, take a look around that lobby area for the chair that is uh connected to summers. So, we have a chair up there. And lastly, uh June 11th, we have 8th grade promotion 0900 on the turf field. on June 12th, the fifth grade farewell ceremony at 9:15 and the cherry on top. June 12th is the graduation 6 p.m. on the Turk. That concludes my update pending. Any questions? Any questions? All good news. Good news. All right. Let you introduce this to us.
012Ready, guys? So, I got word uh that Justin wanted to come back to the board to update you on his progress. remember uh Justin, he came so you came solo last year and you talked about you know the solid works certifications that you had acquired and we said keep in touch and thank you for reaching out u that you letting me know that you wanted to come back to present to the board and last week I met Theo and we did a run through right and I said you have to get it down to like 15 minutes right so we we were about 40 minutes or so and it was awesome, but you you know I was like we got to get this down. So, I am looking forward to uh your your update even
013though I've seen it. I know the board and and public rule look forward to seeing it as well. So, I'll turn it over to you guys. All right. Well, thank you. Um I'd like to introduce ourselves. I'm Justin Felch. I'm a junior at the high school as you guys know. I'm Theo Glock. I'm also a junior at the high school and we would like to present what we've been working on this semester. Um our project is called the hypermotion version one and just this is a motion capture then a brief overview of motion capture it's a it converts your movements to uh digital data. So it will track what you do and it will send that as data. This is used in a lot of uh centers the economy like most notably anim in animation
014and gaming but also you can see it in places like healthcare and uh it enables a very immersive experiences. Now we did this in what's called a tech seminar and a tech seminar is a class for students who have already covered all areas of the subject who want to further their research under an instructor while earning an credit. Our seminar focused specifically on researching and designing our own ma motion capture technology which the estimated cost is about $150. Um the objectives of our project were to develop a motion capture glove for CAD navigation. Uh for those who don't remember last year I came here showing my CAD certifications. CAD is stands for computer automated design and it's basically 3D designing on a computer for prototyping before you have to manufacture a physical product. It's used
015widely in the world of engineering. Solid Works, what the school uses, what we both know how to use, is a very popular one in the professional world. Um, our glove focuses on ergonomic design for comfort. We don't want the user to feel like there's a heavy weight at the end of their arm. Um, and it was really just meant to enhance their experience using the technology. Um, and with that, we would like to show you a quick demonstration. So, you can see on the right is our user interface that we coded ourselves. works specifically for this glove that you see on my hand. And on the left is actually Solid Works. The part specifically is a 3D scan of Theo's hand. Um, which we needed to create that stand to hold the glove. But, um,
016we power on the glove and we know it's powered on when there's a red light on the back. And then we can start connecting to it. There we go. And as soon as it's connected, it starts sensing my hand gestures. So, you can kind of see it flipping back and forth. These are the different views on Solid Works. And you can notice as I change how many fingers I'm holding up, we actually get to see different views of the part. Um, we thought of this used a lot for presentations when people are presenting their part. So, they can be standing up talking about it instead of sitting behind a desk with a computer. And at any point, if you want to disable the glove, like you want to point to something and you don't want
017to change the view, you can actually just make a fist and that will freeze any motion going on. So, no matter what I'm doing with this hand, until I make a fist again, it won't actually detect anything. Um, that's what we did with Solid Works. We have some other features specifically in our settings. So, in our settings, we used this a lot when we were coding. Um, is a terminal that's printing out the integer values of the individual fingers and the sensors readings we're getting back. As well as that graph you can see going all over the place. It's actually a graph of my specific finger movement. So, notice the red line. That is my index finger. And you can notice as I bend my index finger down, that red line dips. And vice versa.
018Um, the next menu we want to show you in our settings is called our gesture menu. Now, we left it blank on purpose so you couldn't see how we start with these things. It's just a single button. Doesn't really look good. Um, sometimes we start with no button and we're coding specifically. Now, this feature we actually added in there is called add gesture. So what it allows the user to do is to add a gesture that isn't native to the glove. So right now if I do a thumbs up nothing happens as we can see close. Um but we can add a gesture like closing Solid Works where if I make a thumbs up and Theo hits add gesture that is now recognized by the computer. So when I make a thumbs up again you
019can notice in the background Solid Works should be closing. Hit the button. Bear with us. Okay. Well, um, that did work earlier. We can show you another one called open mass properties. Open mass properties allow is a menu in Solid Works. Um, we currently have this set to open a blank window when we make the gesture. So, if I now fully open my hand, hopefully that one's working. Okay, those aren't working. Um, Dr. Galloway did see them working. I did see them working. Yes. Um, bear with us that this is a prototype and we had a semester to build it. Um, oh, there it is. There we go. Yep. It was hot. All right, that ends our demonstration. Thank you for bearing with us on that. Justin, make sure you tell them how many lines
020of code you had to write. Oh, yes. Our lines of code, we can actually we have it open there. Oh, yeah. Yes. Uh just a quick look at it. This is our main script. This script isn't very long. It's about uh 100 a little maybe 200 way down. It should be like 139 lines. Um which are it's just the main processing but our user interface was about 700. So we have four different scripts running in cohesion with each other to make this happen. So it's almost 900 lines of code. And now if we return back to the presentation, Theo has some things to pass out for you guys. So these are copies of our research. We can't talk about them super indepth, but it's for you guys to keep. Um it's our exact research papers
021and the kind of it's broken down into general research of how motion capture works, the type of components they commonly use, hardware research which is what we chose to use, and software research, what we chose to use for software. All right, those are for you to keep. Uh we can't touch upon all of it in this presentation unfortunately, but I would like to move on with our electronics. So, we use flex sensors. They're very cheap and they're also uh they measure uh the way they measure our and send data is basically we run it runs an electrical current through it. And the more you bend it, the more resistance is added. So therefore, the voltage would drop. So therefore, we can read the voltage and see at which point due to the change in voltage
022the flex sensor is at. And we this is utilized in a lot of different parts of the ind of the industry but most notably wearable technology like we're doing and it as stated before it converts motions into electrical signals now for the brains the operation the Xiao ESP 32S3 this is a very very compact microcontroller that has a very strong Wi-Fi and Bluetooth antenna. It was actually um well tangent actually so strong that uh we were he was standing at one corner of the lacrosse field. Now I was standing at the other corner of cross field. We were both touching the net and it was still getting a proper reading with very little latency. And this is very strong and very robust. We had not had any problems with it that weren't us specifically. and
023uh very reliable connection. The only problem is if we run a very very complex test, it has the problem of overheating a bit and that's not that fun. Um my favorite part of this project, we had to design a custom circuit board for it. So along with the flex sensors, you need a circuit called a voltage divider and that just basically allows us to get readable data from it. Um, we had to have five voltage dividers, one for each flex sensor and one for each finger. Um, and the reason we didn't just go with any alternatives that were pre-made is the only options are what's called solder soldered breadboards and they come in standard sizes. Typically, they're a square or rectangle and they feel very awkward on the back of your hand. They also don't
024necessarily look very good um and professional. So, we went with our own design here and we designed it specifically to be comfortable. We actually have a we're going to pass that out and around to you guys. That is a copy of our circuit board and front and back view. Basically, uh the corner is cut specifically out of it because when we were testing, we would 3D print uh models of it before we got it manufactured and put it on the back of our hands. And we actually noticed by getting rid of that corner, there was no jabbing sensation in the back of your hand anymore. Um so things like that we took into consideration. And we also really just wanted it to be light. um not really obtrusive to the user. And how this all
025comes together to work is you can see the wires running from each finger. Um so in each of these green little pouches here is a flex sensor that runs to this control board in the middle. And inside that green housing is our custom circuit board you just saw. And that connects to our uh microcontroller, the Xiao. that basically receives all the data, interprets it, and then through this little antenna here, transmits it to the computer for the computer to do the rest of the work in analyzing which gesture it is. Next is well, we had to code all this, which was kind of a pain. So, we chose um for our coding language, we had a lot of options to choose from, but we chose Python. The main reason being that um we both this
026year we both took AP comp science computer science and the main language we code in is Python. So we decided let's just stick with what we know. It's a very complex but also very easy to learn language. It allows for very sorry there's used widely around the world. And one of the main benefits of this is if we need to get let's say a library a special set of functions and codes we can quite literally download that from all the way across you know let's say China across the world for free most of the time and quite quickly and one of the good things about it is due to its simplicity it's very good for beginners but it also has a lot of room for growth and that's why a lot of experts use it
027in the industry. Next is our graphics how we actually u made the UI. We used pi side 6. It is very complex and for us it was war basically learning a new coding language is how much it added to the on top of python but it was very strong and allowed us to do u advanced widgets and multiprocessing. Uh next was how we imported the data. So we used a library called BLEEK which is for BLE data transmission. BLE just stands for Bluetooth low energy. Um the main reason we went with Bleke is because we were able to constantly stream new data to the computer. So there was no latency in it. It was also very robust and reliable. We never had any problems with it that wasn't user error. Um and when something went
028wrong, it typically told us what was wrong. It was very easy to fix. Um, yeah, it overall worked really great. Like we said, we were able to achieve like almost 100 yards of Bluetooth range partially because of this. We had that low latency. And next, we want to talk about our manufacturing. Well, this is the part design. This is actually the case itself on the back of uh housing the micro prior on the back of this glove. And right there is a picture of it opened up in a on shape a 3D uh it's a 3D tag. uh this is particularly web browser version but uh we designed it all by ourselves for a lot of different reasons but the main reason was that if there was an error we could quickly fix it like
029if we printed out we printed it out so we can print it out 3D print out and then test it out immediately and then we see oh this there's this problem and so and so we can just go back into the part and quickly fix it like for example we made this too thin originally so when we tried in the screws, it just broke upon it. It broke. So, we went back and add some more filament to it and made it a bit thicker. And this just allows us to have a lot of feedback, quick feedback. Um, as Theo said, we did do 3D printing. Uh, we chose 3D printing for its accessibility. The school has 3D printers. We both have 3D printers at home and we're very well verssed in them. Uh, specifically, we
030went with a Saturn 4 Ultra, which is a resin printer. Resin printers are basically just very accurate, very precise, very detailed printing which makes it perfect for small parts like these. You'll notice any kind of light clean part like each of the fingertips. That's all resin printed. That's all our design. Um the reason we 3D printed was like Theo said, any problems we had, we could fix ourselves. We didn't have to send a new design to a manufacturer, wait for them to quote it, get back to us, send us the bark just to have another error and have to do it all over again. That being said, oh actually that's a picture of the part in the previous slide. Um this piece right here, that's a picture of it printing on my resin printer at
031home. Um that being said though, we couldn't do everything. So specifically the circuit board we couldn't manufacture ourselves because we don't know how personally how they are put together. We knew how to design it, but putting it together was a whole new challenge. Um, but to try and m mitigate the potential delays we were avoiding by 3D printing, uh, we would put our versions through rigorous testing. Um, and what I mean by that is mainly the only testing we could do was how it felt on the back of our hands. So, we would 3D print a model of it, get a feel for it, see if we liked it. We also had um, a friend of mine who's electrical engineer overlook all the schematics before we ordered a manufactured piece, so we knew it would
032work. Um, and through those specifications, we redesigned three times from the ground up until we got with the circuit board that you saw earlier. Uh, it worked perfectly when we got it. It was amazing. And we because of that, we only had to manufacture once. Well, this is for our eventual version two eventual. And one of the main problems we have with this one is you might have saw when we were demonstrating is we have to uh attach a battery to this mostly because the Xiao the microcontroller does not have an internal battery. It's one of the main downsides of it. And we're eventually going to move away from flex sensors to inertia sensors. The main reason being flex sensors they can really only get the bending motion. They can't get the rotation of your
033wrist, the moving your hands apart, fingers apart, and inertial sensors are just more accurate in general. So, it'd be more data to process and use, but it'd be it'd get better and a lot more u gestures we can add. And the last thing is we're going to make this more manufacturable. What I mean is we're going to have it um see right now it's all stitched up. It's on a quite a nice but uh we're going to we're going to move away from that and move it to a more streamlined process. And if we were to massproduce these we would move away from 3D printing because it's just not fast enough. And that we would like to thank you and open up to questions. That was impressive. What What's the end goal with this thing?
034To massproduce it and sell. Yeah, that would be the idea is to have a product that we could go out and try and massproduce. Um, it's definitely not there yet and we have a lot of work to do before that, but that would be one of our end goals. It's incredible. Good for you guys. I wouldn't know where to start. How about shorter term roles? What's h what happens after summer's high school? Um, after summer's high school, I'm looking at RPI is my main pick for a college. I want to go to study mechanical engineering. Um, I'm going I'm my goal is Yukon. I don't know what the heck I'm going to make sure. And do you think that Summers public schools supported you well with the classes we offer? Who are some of your
035mentors here? Who teaches AP computer science? AP computer science, Mr. Jackson. It's taught by Mr. Jackson. Um, I can speak for myself that I've worked with Mr. Kazi a lot and Mr. Nij um for this project specifically they were both very handsoff about it. They they were a bit out of their depth. Um they helped when they could uh as much as they could but we were really out of their range and that was they think that's a good thing because they want us to be learning and improving faster than they can. Good for you guys. So this is a class you guys did. It said there's an instructor provided. It's not someone from the school. Was this online like you do this during your study hall instead of study hall or something. We we
036took this as a actual class but it was it started out as we both really didn't want to have a study hall. We we would had two study halls and it would just been boring. So Okay. So it's your own class. Yeah. You're the only two people in it. I've done a couple of tech seminars. Basically you you pitch the idea of what you want to do. Like last year I pitched the idea of getting certifications. Um, and then your counselor asks you to put together a list of assignments that they want, when you should be completed, how the teacher might grade them. Um, you return that back. It gets approved by the teacher, the principal, and the counselor. And once that's done, it's basically your own quest. Okay. Outstanding work, guys. It sounds like
037you learn so much about so many things in this process. I'm thinking about the 900 lines of code you wrote, right? And also thinking about AI coming out at the same time. Did you guys use AI in any way? Like did you learn more about how to effectively use that in this process or? Uh yeah, it's well to be honest you might be a little mad I say this but we had to use it a lot because we just didn't have enough time to learn this entire library. So we have to unfortunately we have to take some shortcuts and this what ends up happening is that it leads to a lot of errors like the AI isn't perfect nothing is so it ends up sometimes putting code we go back and we go what what's
038going on here yeah with that being said just because the AI code it was most of the time wrong but through that we did learn like we didn't have an instructor teaching us these new libraries so when the AI would mess up kind of forced us to go back learn it. And it really AI just helped us streamline this. Like if there was code we knew already and we just couldn't afford the time to write 300 lines of it. We just would tell it what we need, have it write it, and then of course we already know the library, we would go back and and edit it. But when it came to not knowing it, AI didn't know it much either. That's awesome, guys. I mean, just to be able to do this kind of
039work is great. Employers are saying now they want people that know how to use AI appropriately like you said learn from it but then fact check it right and you know use that to help make the process more efficient. It sounds like you've done that too. Well it's also we had we learned to one of the big things with AI is how you prompted. We learned how to prompt it better be more specific when to be general and it was good learning experience for us with this rather new technology. It's awesome. The professionals use AI as well, so don't feel bad. They cut corners, too. But the fact that you have access to Python programming, I just I was I was fascinated by that because that is very popular within the industry. Uh I'm in
040that industry and specifically Pratt Whitney right here in East Harford, Connecticut uses a ton of Python. Almost all the engineers over there are Python programmers or had to teach themselves Python programs. So, it's pretty awesome. I think I mentioned it last time you were here when you're talking about the CAT certifications, but uh what I heard was resourcefulness. Like it's one thing to understand this guys, but you guys are sourceful. Like that's that's an entrepreneurial trait that you should really go all in on because the fact that you guys could figure out where and how to get these things done is just impressive. Not just understanding it, but the fact you just went in and figured it out. Good for you guys. Thank you. I agree. I don't consider using AI cutting corners. use what's
041available to you. It's official. It's not the way I'd like to do it, but yeah, it's wicked impressive, boys. Um, is this a rendering of like a future? So, that is a another glove. So, in our general research, we researched a couple different gloves and how they worked and kind of also an idea of how we wanted ours to look work. So, that is a real professional glove priced around like $1,300, I think. And that was kind of the goal we were aiming for ours to look like. Um, if it did, I'll let you guys come up with that decision. I'd like to imagine we're pretty close. Give it a year. Yeah. What would you sell yours for? Um, right now, like USS, well, not Yeah. If you massproduce them, if we massproduce them, I
042would probably put it at around $800 if we were able to develop the code more. I said we're it's really only recognizing, you know, how many fingers you're holding up, but it is capable of more. This may be a dumb question because I have no idea what I'm talking about this, but is it more like because there's going to be people that want them on the other hand, too. Is that with the code? Is that something you got to redo? Um, not. We shouldn't really have to change much. No. So the only basically how this works is this our microcontroller sends it in the order of index, ring, uh index, middle, ring, pinky, thumb. And the only reason it knows that is just where these are plugged in. So if I were to switch where
043the index finger and the ring finger were plugged in, it would think that the index is the ring and vice versa. So really working with another hand, uh, no, I could probably put this on my right hand. It would just be very uncomfortable. What do you mean when you say the chip is uncomfortable on the back side like sitting here? Um, we had a we tried a square and rectangular chip that cuz we have to place it so low on here. Um, wearing a watch too, it would hit the watch. Um, and also sometimes the corners would you would feel it hitting your skin and that's not a really comfortable user. Like if you were to bend it back, you can sometimes feel it jab into your skin. Yeah. Got it. What would you say
044was the most challenging thing that you um me personally it's a mix between the code because it's our first year coding this kind of thing. So we learned a lot more than we did in traditional competi. But without those basics, we wouldn't be there. And then also the um circuit board design. That was something neither of us had ever done before. That was very new. I I mean, I've played a little bit with uh electronics and breadboards, but nothing nothing like designing my own circuit board. For me, it would definitely be the color. I mean, it's I've never I'm not a big fan of it. It's too tedious for me. And when I'm giving something new like that, I just it was too annoying. Other questions or comments? Impressive. Beyond impressive. Thank you. Way over
045my head. It is this feels like impressive. Great presentation. Thank you. Coming back next year, right? Most likely. Good. Well done. Thank you. See what comes next. Thank you for coming. Thank you. Good night. Thank you. Okay. Everybody ready for hope report? [Laughter] All right. So, you got the um May financial report. Uh the two biggest things um as part of the May report that were an update from the April um that I want to draw attention to is in the administrator's line. Um there are some administrators that are looking they didn't get to use all of their vacation time this year. So as part of um their agreements whether it's with the union or just their contracts with us they can either get five days carried over into the next year or they can
046ask for five days being paid out. Uh three of them have chosen to have five days paid out so we'll have to pay that at the end of June and I've accounted for that in um the May report. The second thing uh that happened in May is that we received the um I think at one point I talked about the state legislature giving 40 million towards excess cost uh more money in 40 million and more money in excess cost. We are getting about uh we're expecting $47,300 in June for that. So I have adjusted our special ed numbers to reflect that additional excess cost that we should be receiving. I've submitted or I've started submitting um those invoices to the town to pay those bills. So, I've made adjustments to the special lines on there.
047So, that um as of the end of May has us at $105,000 in the black, which is great. Um we are going through for June to kind of give you an idea of where we are for June. We are starting to go through our encumbrances. We typically um at in June start clearing up a lot of those spring invoices that I've released for spring curriculum. We also have blanket purchase orders for electric and fuel and insurance and the monthly expenses that we have. Um we start going through those and really kind of honing in on what our last payments are going to be. So I expect June to release some money there. Um and we will uh talk to Dr. Galloway about the things that we could purchase now that maybe we didn't budget for
048in our budget coming up in 2526. So that typically includes we'll top off our oil tanks. We haven't had an oil delivery since February or March. Um so we'll top off the tanks, make sure that those are all set for the start of the school year. Um we'll buy paper. We haven't really bought any paper. I've been kind of distributing it and being careful with where we are. Um and didn't want to buy ahead too early. Um, so I'll pay pay ahead on that and get us stocked for the summer um because they'll do a lot of um because we do open sed and we had some uh math curriculum that we were working on this year. We went through quite a bit of paper so we need to restock on that. And then um
049in technology we have uh staff computers that are not in compliance with our cyber security insurance that we need to get in compliance with. Some of that we did plan for in the budget but not 100%. We This is our opportunity possibly to get ahead on that. Um so we'll evaluate that as we close out purchase orders and get caught up uh with end of year purchases and see where we land. We did agree with this town that we would financially partner with them. They gave us a really great u increase for our budget next year and uh we said that we would actively give that money back. um we want to make sure that we are all set and ready to go for the school year and then we'll return money to the town
050whatever we don't spend. So that's where we are for May and then looking ahead for end of fiscal. We've got about three weeks left of the school year. Um so that's where we'll be and I'll report in probably July May pro maybe August um because we go typically go until July 31st on closing out the fiscal year. So, I'll I'll have definite numbers for you guys and let you know where we land. Official numbers will be through the audit, which we did start. Uh, we had the auditors out last week. They did their preliminary numbers for invoices and payroll. Everything went well there. We'll see them again at the end of September, October. They'll have the official return number in the end of fall, beginning of winter. So, that's where we are for the fiscal
051year. We're wrapping things up. So the excess cost is that more than what you thought? I forget. So originally if we go back to the very original amount it was $236,000 that we were expecting of 239 in the 230s based on our February report that we submitted to or March report March 1st report that we sent to them we got a reduction in our excess cost down up down to 213,000 just based on the state people across the state submitting their their costs and it's there's only a set amount of money that is distributed amongst all the districts in in the state. Um and so we were reduced to 213,000. Then as part of the session this past winter spring the um the state said we're going to put $40 million back into excess cost.
052That gave us 47,000 back. So um we're in the 260s. So that's what I will that I have submitted to the town to pay. The town gets that money. They pay our bills for us on that. Um so while we initially thought that we were getting hit with a less number returned back to us in reimbursement, they they did make the decision to add that to to this year's. Um and I was reading I haven't caught up on everything that was settled last week with the session. Um, but it does sound like 40 million will be added to excess costs for the next two years. Um, we'll see if they end up giving us more at some point, but the good news is that they are increasing from 180 million to or 221 million in
053excess cost across the state. So, we'll see. We're still not fully funded. And then what did they finally decide on the cost sharing formula? Uh, we're going to be held harmless. So this year we were supposed to start seeing a $90,000 decrease in what the town was going to get. They made the decision to hold us harmless for any district that was supposed to be getting a reduction in ECS. They're not for the next two years. Okay. So um the town and and uh the CFO and I have had that conversation in uh we've been talking about that since March or April because we had been given a heads up that that was likely going to pass. Now anything could change. Governor hasn't signed anything yet. Um, but we're we're hopeful that they should not
054have a $90,000 decrease and it should just be held flat. Okay. So, they should see I think it's 5.6 million in ECS funding. Okay. So, I think uh earlier in the year you shared with the board that there were some freezes put in place to control costs. Um, it seems like that strategy worked at the end of the year and to return that money to the town. Following the heels of the presentation we just saw from the students and what they're learning shows good teamwork between the town boards and um just doing the best for the town that we possibly can and I applaud you for the work, Stephanie. Yeah. Thank you. And I and while we did freeze um we froze in November because we weren't sure what was happening with some of our
055um special ed expenses and um unexpected expenses there. Um, I did reopen that up right before probably March or so. Um, and said, "Let's get our spring curriculum. If there was anything that the staff needed, they were allowed to purchase and they did responsibly. The administration um really stepped up and and made sure that we were purchasing what we needed for the spring and not buying things that were a little bit more than, you know, beyond what we really needed. So, that was very helpful. But it did we did unfreeze and uh we were able to I think the measures and controls of things like paper that could walk easily in the school district is important in controlling cost and so um I just feel like you did a very um very good job in
056handling all that and getting us to this point and u you know it's easier to get the support of the other boards in town when we're doing our part to return anything that's in excess and I think it all adds up to seeing students uh like the ones that were just in front of us because you know it does take an investment to be able to provide that level of education. So thank you again. Thank you. Okay. Anything else? Okay. Thank you, sir. Okay. Opportunity to add or delete agenda item. And tonight we do actually have a motion to add an agenda item. I make a motion to add agenda item 9.3 under new business for the first posting of the Eureka Math Squared math curriculum for K through8 for the 2526 school year. Okay,
057we have a second for them from JT. All right, any discussion? This will be the first posting. We'll do the second posting June 23rd. So hopefully that we can approve it then. All right. Voting on the motion or So we're voting on to add this to the agenda. That's all we're Okay. All those in favor of adding 9.3 item and that's unanimous. Okay. So having Well, we'll do that when we get there. Yeah. getting ahead of myself. All right, next one is a motion for the consent agenda from Kim and a second from Shane. All right, any questions on the consent agenda? All right, all those in favor? That's all say unanimous. All right, old business, new business. So we have the first posting of the suspension policy 5114. This will be the actually the
05815th revision that we have done on this one policy. It's a long policy. I can save you a lot of time. The only change in this policy is on page 10. I think the policy is 20 something pages long. and the state has changed the definition of bullying. That's the only change out of this whole policy because we just redid this whole thing last summer. Um so you can kind of take a look at that and we'll vote on that on the next meeting. The other one this is administration policy hiring school administrators. It's a new policy but it's not a new practice. We've never had it actually in policy with what we actually do. And so this is one of the ones that K recommends is you really want a policy with what authority
059you've given your superintendent of schools. So it's basically that's what we've been been doing. Nothing new or different. Okay. All right. So now we'll go to 9.3 and that will be the first posting of the Eureka Math Squared curriculum. Dana, do you want to make a comment about the I would just say that in your packets you put anformational packet that was provided by the math program. Um it's information about the program. The very first page has a QR code that will bring you to a site called ED reports. Um it's an independent site that bests programs for curriculum alignment, rigor assessment. So you can use your for that. Uh this wraps up almost a two-year process of a math leadership team that had K to8 representation. Uh we looked at multiple programs. We piloted
060uh two programs. We did site visits and then uh today the subcommittee uh got an in-depth presentation about Eureka Squar, which is the program we moved forward and it was presented by members of the math leadership team. Um, it was well done in that it was I think you saw the value. I could see all your head nodding at the subcommittee and hearing the teachers speak to this program. Um, I've been in the district a long time. This is the first time that we've ever presented a K to8 aligned program. I can't think of another time that we've had that and there's value in that alone. Um, just because of the vertical articulation that our students will have. So, um, we're excited about this. Uh, all the m lie and wait like we say between
061the first and second morning same capacity that we did with the reading program. They're in the central office. You can come and take a look at them, preview them. Then on the 23rd, we can answer questions if you have any questions about that. So will we get the same well I guess will we get the same presentation that the curriculum committee went through or does it not work? We haven't done that in the past. It goes through the subject and is approved. It doesn't. But um at 23rd, um Tim Lyn and I will be here to answer questions. Is it okay for us to ask questions tonight? Sure. If you have a question. Um I guess I would start with the committee on this before reading all this chance to read it. What's the number
062one reason that this is our best program for us? What do we think is in terms of math? Why this program is right for us? besides being K through eight, which is the first time ever, but what we were kind of hearing was the usability of teachers talking about why they like this program and the aha moments of the kids the way this is kind of set up. It's kind of the short version. Is this the same one that builds on one another that we saw with all the dots in the chart? So, it builds from kindergarten to 8th grade, but builds off the concepts from one year to the next. Actually, they they were saying that things that were happening in first grade in seventh grade, you know, they were still having some of
063the spiral spirals. Yeah. So, I would I would encourage you to look at materials and the materials around. Yeah. I understood your question correctly, Carl. You think you're asking like why this one particular Yeah, exactly. It sounded like the teachers spoke about it tonight. There's a bunch of them here talking about it. Uh and it really aligns with the work that they're trying to do right now with their instructional practices with math. It's very supportive of that. Um you know in addition to like you said it flowing from one year building the aha moments. Um, but I think they looked at a couple, two in particular, and they felt that this one was more aligned with where they're currently at with their practices like that. And they did visit Coventry that has used it. And
064I think Coventry has used it for six years and have had such good results that they expanded it into the middle schools. And so it wasn't only just reading this on a piece of paper, going out and visiting, spending the day, actually watching the classes, but then having time one- on-one with the teachers asking questions. Um, so I think this was kind of a allin approach with about 15 people on this committee going through it. But the fact that they've actually piloted this program and have already seen results is um very uh to me very exciting because we've we've tried as we know different programs different grades and I think this time I I think I am very hopeful it was also common core aligned too yes which is nice and then also not it's
065aligned but it's very uh a lot of the same language so when it comes to the aspect the kids are kind of seeing style of you're getting exposure to the different ways to access that test. That was going to be my next question for Dr. Galloway is do do you see us incorporating some goals on growth since we're implementing this in the ESPback scores or the related math scores that beyond ESPback maybe um other assessments that we see? So, do you see us setting some goals for us now that we're implementing new math program so that we have something to measure ourselves against to see if it worked? Exactly. To answer your question, you posing that to me? Yeah, I I would say I would say yes. You know, the stars are aligning. You know,
066you have a K uh math program. Uh we have a new reading program. And since I started here, I said, you know, a lot of uh our effort is really understanding in real time how students are growing and progressing. and with without having a program that standard aligned and and runs through the grades, it's hard to track student growth. So you all you're chasing after student growth like after the fact. Um so I think that these two moves with u the CKLA and the math program will reap benefits especially at the at the lower levels the the elementary school and the middle school. you know, um, you know, I've used this analogy before. Depending on the district, they will use certain programs, the programs that work for them. Um, you know, we we singled out
067Coventry, um, because they are a town that they're two durves below us, but their student performance you can't deny. So that's why you guys went on a field trip to Coventry to really understand what's happening there and and they've done a really good job closing gaps. And I've been a big proponent on not only remediation but acceleration uh in trying to find out what our impact is on students like in in real time so we can monitor and adjust instruction. So it's evidence-based and resultsoriented proven other ways. It is and expect a lift. Yeah. I don't think so. If I could speak, one of the things that we did as part of our process was we only looked at programs that were I'm going to call it all green ed report. So the state department
068of ed has put together a website called go open CT that has model curriculum and so we only looked at programs that were on that website. So the state done some of the leg work that we used to do. Um, so I felt that it was my job and Tim and Lynn's job to put high quality materials to the teachers, have them pilot it, and then it comes down to usability. So I already knew things were vertically aligned. It would have gotten in their hands if it wasn't common line, that sort of thing. So it's a high quality program, but what program would be the right one for summers right now and for us. I think the other thing that was brought out is that what the teachers liked was it does have workbooks that
069come with the program. One of the questions the curriculum committee has raised is the concern about how many how much time kids are doing stuff on the computer and doing math on a computer instead of pencil and paper has been a question that's raised. And with this program, they're going to be doing a lot with pencil and paper. They're going to be writing stuff on a whiteboard. So, it's the physical of doing math, not just looking at it on the screen. So, um I think they were obviously very enthusiastic, but I think it addressed a lot of questions that we've raised from past programs. So, sounds good. It'll be So, it'll be going live this year, this coming. So, That's normal, right? Like the teachers will be prepared to roll this out. Yeah. So, part
070of what we've done over the last few years with this math leadership team is we have representatives from each grade level that would be using the program. Um, so that's helpful because at the elementary school where you could have five teachers at a grade level, they each have a grade level rep. Um, and so the hope is that it gets approved. We already have the funds allocated from the budget. I said to the subcommittee that includes money for professional development, any m as well as the program itself. Um we would order it as soon as July one hits because that's my Stephanie deadline, right? Can't order anything till July one and then we would get things in hand. We have um coaches which are game changers for program implementation. We've never had that before. Um
071and so I'm excited about that because both the coaches and the program itself who provide professional development for the teachers. Um so yes, we're hitting the ground running, you know, within the first weeks of so they'll have that training before school. That's the plan. Um I am not hearing that there's delays in shipping. Sometimes in the past there was delays but um the plan is to have to hit the ground running. Um and then we have four August professional development day before the start of school and then those half days embedded. So between those the half days um coach support okay the teachers will be ready. So when we implemented the um the new reading program, Sarah Martin did an evening session for the parents to kind of explain what how it was different. It
072was actually so well received. She did I think two additional ones. I went to two of them and it was very good and they've already talked about doing the same thing in September for the new math program. um because one of the things Sarah did was to explain a lot of the resources um that parents could use. So, you know, we learn what goes well and then we continue with that. So, um I think this is a lot of teamwork here that's been all put together. The committee was what 15 just about. We had special education, regular education, uh math interventionist, um administration, coaches, Kate So yeah, I think about 15 by the time you're all set. And Carl actually in one of the interventionist said that she had two students who phased out because
073they with this new program they were they just you know got it clicked on. Great. So all right so there'll be time next meeting for questions. Stop in. The stuff is right on the side counter in um central office. And do we have to add first posting here to the 9.3 on the agenda? Yeah, we just Oh, you mean for agenda? Yeah, just Okay. 9.3. Great. Thank you. Okay. Committee reports, curriculum. Well, you all heard what we what we had today. So, um, and our next meeting is in September. Okay. And notice that that is at 5:30, right? That's not a typo. That's That's September. 5:30. It is September. All right. Policy. Our next meeting is June 23rd at 6 o'clock. Uh, planning and finance. Yeah, we'll probably meet in August to discuss end of
074year transfers to clean up the the end of year. No need before end. We can meet before the first August or the is it one August meeting or two August meeting? Just before that or do you need a one before that? Uh I should be able to do it then. Okay. Because I mean we did last year. Yeah. and and I don't need transfers to be done in order to do my state reporting because I just report what we actually expended. Okay. Okay. Souring negotiations on schedule. Um building committee. The building committee will be appointed tomorrow night at uh the board of selectments meeting. Um and I will be the um representative for the board of ed um for this revised committee. So, but I want to thank you, Mike, for you've already put in
075a couple years on this and have gotten us to this point. Now, pick up the ball and get to the goalpost. So, hopefully once this new committee is formed that we can get going. Okay. Um any report from correct? No, I uh just the next meeting is coming up Wednesday, this upcoming Wednesday. Uh but nothing to note to report back to the board. Okay. And SCF, anything to report? Uh outside of a really nice thank you card signed by the xylophone troop. Yeah. Uh that was a feelood email. Yes. Sounded like that was very well received. It was a really cool grant where they funded the acquisition of some instruments and it's a very cool presentation. I remember that one. My son did that. I didn't know that was an SEF grant. Yeah. Oh my
076gosh, it was so cute. He loved it. Loved it. Yeah, they all they all sign they all signed the card with notes. And I think last time I said that I watched two grants, but I didn't tell you what they were. One was U Lyn Ericson, you know, when we had um uh we have a book vending machine at the at the SCES and Lynn decided she needed STEM projects in a vending machine. All right. So that that was an approval project and the other one was Tenley asked for games that are connected to the to the curriculum at the high school, you know, to promote team building and teamwork, critical thinking and what have you. whole list of of games. So, they were both very well presented. All right. And then the advanced calendar
077you got in your bread folder. So, 8th grade promotion, June 11th at 9, grade five is June 12th at 9:15. And of course, high school graduation starts at 6 o'lock sharp on Thursday. The weather looks like the best day of the week so far was Thursday. And I believe there's five of us that will be attending. So, as you know, this seats are reserved right in the front row. It'll just say board of ed right on one of those chairs in the front row. Um, so I think the uh the gates open at 5:00, but nice when you have a reserve seat. Parking is probably All right, I think that's on audience to citizen, staff, students. All right. If not, we'll take a motion to go into executive session. I move that the board enter
078into executive session and invite Dr. Galloway to discuss the non staff wage adjustments for the 2025 2026 school year and discuss his evaluation. Okay. A second for the motion. Second. All right. All those in favor. Okay. Unanimous. So we will go into executive session at 8:06. Thank you for coming. Good. Okay, we are in public session at 8:57 p.m. and we have a motion. Y So, we'll move to accept the recommendations of the superintendent on the proposed salary increases for non-UN staff for the 2025 2026 school year. Okay. and a second to the motion from Shane. All right, any discussion? All those in favor? That's unanimous. So, we will take a motion to adjurnn. So, moved and a second. Also from all those in favor also unanimous. So, we will adjourn the meeting at 8:59.
079Go.