001three. Um, call the meeting to order. We'll start with roll call. I understand the question. You're recording. Mike Ber He um Mike Sharon. Mike Sharon. He Joe Kleti is not here. Kirsten Ernson, Kirsten Erson, and Pam Ferington. Perington Marborino Drew Gin Drew Gin Marbor Gabe Marks Gabe Marks Hebrin Amy Romanchuck not coming Scott soyat Scotty handover Heather Summer from Hebrin um and the student reps are not not going to be with us tonight so if we can all stand for the pledge of allegiance I pledge alleges 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. Thank you. Okay. Keep Andover Marbor community engagement and attendance at board public meetings is welcomed. The public comment segment
002of the meeting agenda is set aside so the board may receive public comments. Procedurally, public remarks will be limited to three minutes and citizens will be asked to identify themselves. Because the board is limited by the Freedom of Information Act to discussing only matters on the agenda, the board is not permitted to engage in the discussion of the comments presented. Is there anybody here that would like to make public comments? Scratch your head. No, itchy head. Anybody online would like to make public comment? Okay. All right. Do we have any items for the agenda that we would like to add or delete? Just need an item. No. All right. Uh, the board chair report is next on the agenda. Um, I think, uh, as we're getting ready for the end of the year, we've got
003some great events that are coming up this this week. If everybody has time, we've got the eighth grade promotion that I would like you to encourage you to go to and the high school graduation. Um, students have been finishing up. I um had the opportunity to stop in very briefly at the evening of the arts which I don't know if anybody has had the opportunity to go to that. It is truly amazing. They have um performances by the students. The the choir and the band perform student art um items are presented both drawings, painting, sculpture, all sorts of things. It was I was blown away. Um I think and then and they really did a good job of representing the different art items. Um if you can go next year I would encourage it. It
004was really sort of a a testament to the work that the kids are kids are doing here. Um and that's all that I have. Uh so I just got a couple of things. I also obviously was in attendance at the Evening of the Arts. Definitely one of my favorite events in the evening. just I I love the coffee style performances that the students do in the calf, the artwork that's on display. I think it's a great because it's a it's a true community event because we also bring in and display student artwork from our three elementary districts that feed into uh feed into RAM eventually. So, it's just a really great uh opportunity to connect with with the entire community. Um, speaking of the arts, I want to congratulate student uh members of the RAM
005uh theater, the drama and musical program. Uh they received a Halo award the other week for best hair and makeup design. Um uh student uh the the team was led and designed by Trevan Jackson. Uh and and then assisted by Car Carmela Horvetail um Sarah Brontworth, Eliza Loma and Jasine Pendleton and middle schoolers Audrey Wright and um Lydia Merritt. Uh so they um pulled off and and won this award. The award, the Halo Award, is uh been recognizing Connecticut high school art theater or um sorry, theater programs for the past 20 years. Everything from acting, from stage design, technical uh work, and obviously hair and makeup. So, it's a great thing uh that our students will recognize for that. Um I want to recognize uh and congratulate Trevor Hooker. He is a senior at Ram
006High School. He recently came back uh from the um uh the uh future problem solvers uh uh program. They did an international competition in at the University of Indiana and Trevor placed fourth out of all all students across the country um in uh global intern individual global issue competition. So a testament you may recall we had them present to us actually in the beginning of the school year. Um, super excited for Trevor and the rest of the kids that were able to participate in that program. Um, very, uh, recent news, I want to congratulate our boys golf team who earlier today won the state championships for division 2. Um, it was actually down at Tallwood Country Club. I was texting with Dan Trudeau all day hoping that I could get there. He was keeping me
007a breast. They they won by a pretty good margin, so it was an exciting um, thing for our boys golf team. Great way for them to end the season. Um, I want to make sure that I thank the teachers and staff for a great school year. Um, I I hope that all of our teachers and staff are able to go off to a much well-deserved uh vacation and and rest and rejuvenate for the next couple of months before we kick it into gear for the 25 26 school year, which will be here uh upon us very quickly. But I just appreciate all the work that they do for students and families uh and the community. Um, and then finally, I'll just acknowledge our seniors and our eighth graders who are going to be getting ready
008to go on to that next exciting chapter of their life and congratulate them. Looking forward to the promotion ceremony on Friday morning as well as graduation on Friday night. Um, and I just wish our students all the best as they segue into summer as well. And that concludes my comments. I would just um say too, if you do plan on attending, if you can let administration know so we've got enough chairs um just email Jeff. Yeah. Do we know yet if it's in or out? Uh, we will not know until Friday morning. We anticipate hopefully being able to make the call by 10 o'clock because we have to get delivery of all the chairs and staging and they have to know a day in advance where they're going to set those things up. I I'm
009hopeful at this point that we can be outside as we all want to be. I the forecast is as it has been for much of the past month and a half. It looks like there is the possibility of rain. So pass out umbrellas. Okay. Um so that brings us to the student program spotlight. Yeah. So uh I want to thank uh students from Mr. Jans's uh class who are here in the inquiry team who are here to do a presentation on their uh the homeless homelessness unit that they did. I'll turn it over to Mr. Jansis to maybe kick things off and we have some students who are going to do a presentation for us. Yeah. Unfortunately, you have to use the microphone so that they can hear you on on the Zoom. Oh, yes.
010Yes. Uh hopefully this is on. Hold on. All right. Is it working? Yep. All right. Perfect. Um anyway, uh the homelessness unit is something we've been doing on the Inquiry Academy for a number of years. Um and it's a great opportunity for our students, uh number one to uh learn something about uh current events, things that are going on in their community. Um and it's also a way for them to share their learning. Um this uh unit culminates in them actually going to the advisories around the school and talking to their peers and presenting in advisories to their peers about this issue. Um so they learn a little bit of public speaking and of course some students uh win the prize of being able to talk to the board of education. um the the the
011you know entry fee was being absent on the day we presented. So uh they got to do this um and they're going to talk a little bit about their presentation and uh they actually have a few slides that they're going to share with you as well. We're going to start off with Celia and pardon her voice by the way. She's fighting through great power. Hello. Hello everybody. My name is Celia and we will be presenting about homelessness. This was an interdisciplinary unit, meaning that we did something in math, ELA, science, and social studies. Part of this unit was a field trip where we went to the real artways and saw a film titled Inente. It was about a girl who was homeless with her family and she eventually found her way through art. After we
012went there, we went to the Parkville markets and we listened to two speakers named Ralph and Rosemary. Both Ralph and Rosemary talked about their experiences being homeless. In math, we did a budgeting activity. We learned what it was like to be living off minimum wage. At the end, we answered reflection questions such as what it would be like to maybe live with a roommate or how hard it was to actually live off minimum wage. Something I learned was that is very difficult to live off minimum wage. I had to figure out my needs versus my wants and where I should spend my money, what I should would like most to have from my wants. We had to choose between places to live, different modes of transportation, and different meal plans that satisfied our needs and
013wants. Living on minimum wage was not easy and that was just on a worksheet. Overall, I learned that not everyone can afford their needs and it's important to be aware of everyone's money situations. Hi, I'm Jackson. I did the socialized section. the social section. We had to go on online sources and find causes of homelessness, demographics, and watch interviews of people experiencing homelessness. For the socialized part of the project, we had to find five myths about homelessness with the truths and 10 facts. For example, a myth, people that are homelessness are violent criminals. The truth to that is not having a home doesn't make someone more likely to commit a violent crime. Statistically, people experiencing homelessness are far more likely to be victims of violent crimes. Um, with part two, we had to find f
014four facts to about homelessness. One fact is 771,480 people were homeless in the US on a given night in January 2024. And 4.2 2 million is how many people experience homelessness in a year. You need to work at a minimum wage for 107 hours just to afford median pricing apartments in Connecticut. 10.6% of Connecticut's residents receive SNAP benefits in 2024. Hi, my name is Jacqueline and in our science unit, we talked we had to create a slideshow about food safety and insecurity and how some places don't have enough food to go around to for people to get the right nutrients they need and how it's very hard to keep a balanced diet every day. And where places like food deserts is very difficult to find places and food deserts are basically places where there are
015multiple pe there are many people who do not have enough nutrients in their body and are not able to get enough nutrients and some places in Connecticut are Hartford, Bridgeport and New Haven and we there are many people with disabilities all across the world in getting food Insecurity is very is even more difficult for them because they are cuz it can be more challenging to get the right nutrients for their body if they are missing a limb or need extra nutrients. And then in our English unit, we had to do a reflection of our field trip because we took a field trip to Hartford on April 2nd and we went to a we went to Real Artways and saw a film about a girl named Innocante who was homeless all of her life but was
016able to make a career of art at only 15 years of age which was very impressive for her and her family. And then we talked to a program called Hands-On Harford. And we talked to two amazing speakers, Ralph and Rosemary, um, who had two very different, you also kind of similar stories. Ralph uh, got into a very bad car accident and he got addicted to pain meds, but after many years of having this drug in his body, he felt like his body needed it. Um but after his doctor stopped prescribing it, he was he got dictious street drugs and was constantly in and out of jail and was not able to hold a job because he kept on relapsing. But he was finally able to become sober after 15 years and was able to reunite
017with his daughter. Um, Rosemary on the other hand was only 20 years old when she was introduced to crack cocaine and sadly got addicted which led to um her living on the streets and she had to give up her four children, had to leave them with her mother because she was not able to provide everything they needed to live. Um, but after many years of living on the streets and seeing some very terrible things, she was able to come sober and was able to get reunite with her kids. All right. Thank you very much, guys. Um, and also to our own horn. Um, in terms of the FPS, there were some middle schoolers who went. I know we have two on our team, Miselume and Juliet Manthorne. And I don't know if there's kids on
018other teams that went, but there's middle schoolers doing that as well. Uh if you have any questions for them, feel free. Otherwise, I will let you go. Oh, there is one. I told you there would be one. I actually have two. Oh, perfect. Go ahead. So, were you guys surprised by the amount of homelessness that that you were exposed to so close to home? Yeah. Were you surprised uh you know, just right down the road how much homelessness there was? Um even when we were walking, we we we pass people who are homeless. Uh was that a surprise to you guys? you have the strongest voice. I did find it very surprising. I did not expect at all to see that many homeless people and it really put like my life in a new perspective
019for me and how lucky I am to have everything that I have. um kind of what she said it put into a whole new perspective because our science teacher kind of told us that in our lives the worst thing is like sometimes not being able to find our favorite food for lunch or breakfast whereas some people do not have the right of getting lunch and breakfast every day. Yeah. I was surprised how much people were actually homeless near here. Yeah. Yeah. So, did it change, you know, you mentioned it changed your perspective, but um you know, thinking forward, um do you see yourself maybe volunteering for these organizations or studying something in that field to to help in that area? Um, I might like help an organization, but I don't think I'll go into like
020that field. Don't forget to mention who won the can drive for food. Mention it casually. Um, so RAM did a food drive where we had where all the teams were able to donate food, canned foods to a local food service and Inquiry won by a lot. And it was all Mr. Jances. I see that we never lose. By the way, um I I tell my students they don't want to be the kids who are on our team the first year I lose. It will be an unhappy day uh when when Mudville finally loses. Um, any other questions? Yeah. Was this your first experience with homelessness? Yeah. Was this the first time you guys learned about homelessness or or met people who had been homeless or anything like that? It was my first time really learning
021about it, but not my first time hearing about it. Like, I've heard stories of like crazy people living on the streets who have mental issues and are like walking around with shopping carts full of food. But I really kind of learned about it. It was a whole new perspective. It's not always the same person every time. Everybody has a different story. And like Jacqueline said, I've like watch TV shows and normally homeless people are uh shown as these people who are have mental issues and are addicted to drugs. Like Jacqueline said, it's really not all that half the time. Sometimes it's just misfortune and a path that just didn't work out too well. Yeah. Kind of what Jacqueline said. It was my like first time hearing about what it's like to actually be homeless and
022what like happens when you're homeless. And they even have a teacher whose uh parents were war refugees and were homeless. So they they learned a little bit from me talking about, you know, World War II refugees and homelessness from that era. Any other questions? Oh, you guys are free. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you guys so much for coming. Thank you. Thank you you guys. Thank you. Great job. Okay, that brings us to the um consent agenda. Do you want to Yeah. So, uh on the consent agenda, there's uh a handful of things. There's the approval of the minutes from the regular board meeting on the 19th of May and then the special meeting on May 28th. Uh the other thing is the approval of changes or deletions to um certain policies. Uh
023these were all presented at our last board meeting as a first reading. Um I didn't have any comments or questions or recommended changes to any of those policies. So my recommendation is to approve the consent agenda as presented. So move. Okay. First is Scott. So yeah, do we have a second? I'll second. Mike Sharon. Mike Sharon. Any other discussion or questions about the Okay. All in favor. B vendor Woodson's and the other one was from Chartwells. Chartwells was the predecessor to it since before. Um, we opened the bids and after reviewing the bid submissions, uh, the team scored individually. So, we didn't score together. It wasn't a group effort. It was an individual scoring that I had to then tally all the scores. And, um, based on the scores that were presented, um, Chartwells was
024the winner of the bid. And are there any questions? I just had a comment that the amount of points assigned to food quality and menu seems low in comparison to the others. Um just I we we choose the points um so so some points it the guest did what we can award to them. Okay. So yes. So the state the state gives I mean I saw the categories they're they're pre-printed on there but then we hand wrote the point in in the beginning we have a template that we work off of. So there suggest to us just food quality sounds like it' be a good thing to bump up a little on the the point scale menu too but especially food quality. Okay. Do we have a motion to authorize the superintendent to enter into
025a contract with Chartwells? So move move this first. So if someone can amend um to authorize the superintendent to enter the contract um pending state. Ah okay. So the motion needs to be to authorize the superintendent to enter into contract pending a the state's approval with chart walls. I'll still Mike Buller again second Drew. Thank you. Any other discussion on that? Okay. All in favor? Opposed? Um and abstain. Okay, that motion passes. Come to the budget appropriation transfer. Okay. So on um Okay. So 9.2 is the enclosure that this correlates to. So um when we go out to bid our bid when we do our budget, I'm sorry. When we prepare our budget, we estimate what the dollars are going to cost us for computers. We have a life cycle that we follow and we
026also estimate what the finance rate might be. So we develop a package um based on the cost of items currently and the interest rate that was being proposed by the finance bank. Um we're short a little bit to purchase everything that's on the life cycle that needs to be replaced. So basically um I need to remove $11,54 worth of items so that we can keep the interest the payment that is budgeted which is $60,000 for four years. So that is five computers for central office and then uh two computers I believe for um the new security officers that are um coming on board. And that's where that $11,54 comes from. So basically, this is requesting permission from the board to allow us to use this year's funding to purchase those items so those items can
027stay out of recycling the life cycle even moving forward. Okay. So, do we have a motion to transfer $11,54 from systemwide special education public transportation to systemwide administrative tech services equipment? So move I'm sorry public tuition not transportation as I read this it says public transportation oh it should say tuition by the memo so mine says tuition the memo I have memo but the motion is t oh okay so what should it be it should be tuition okay so do we have a motion to transfer $11,54 from systemwide IDE special education public tuition to systemwide administrative tech services equipment. So Gabe uh first second Scott Soyette any other discussion on that. So yeah I I'm still a little bit confused. So, we have this cycle where we budget 60,000 a year, fouryear cycles to cover
028the equipment. And what we're doing now is there's additional equipment that won't fit into that 60,000. And that's why we have to move. Okay, I got it. That's I just want to make sure I understood that. And that's what you meant by remove it from the financial finance package is that it's we're going to buy these. Does that mean they are out of the the cycle in general? No, no, they will be kept in cycle because we're replacing them now. So, yeah. July, June, same difference, right? They'll be on the same cycle. Okay. Any other discussion on that? Okay. Um, all in favor? I opposed and anyone abstain? Thank you. Okay, that brings us to 9.3, the personnel report. So, I just I have one resignation to share for this evening. Dan Trudeau, our athletic
029director, has resigned effective June 30th, 2025. He has been employed by the district since August 1st, 2019, and we certainly wish Mr. Trudeau all the best in his new uh position. Um 9.4 is financials. Okay, so um I'm going to say this outright. Um 9.4B. Unfortunately, the information was not ready for this time. So, there will be no food service report. And then there you have a handout that I left for you that I had the information. Um, so that's the stiff information, but I'm going to start with 9.4A. Excuse me. Um, so that is our net favorable position as of right now um is $958,168. That's what we're projecting. Um there is a projected shortfall in revenue of $238,352. So um when you net those two out, the real net projected net favorable position
030is $719,816. Um excess cost, we were able to recoup some of the loss because the state of Connecticut funded um our district $64,472 additional. Um there's savings that we're realizing in salaries due to movement of staff. Um the benefits associated with that, some purchase services, and then again tuition. We had to budget 100% of magnet school. In addition, we've had um brought back special education students that we were able to save money on that. In addition, um excuse me. Um the middle school baseball field PD project will be starting um on or about June 16. Um the reserve for general education fund. I'm happy to report our material containment center is standing. It looks lovely. Um we just had to do some more um I guess to keep it from weed growing. We're trying to
031put uh driveway um fabric down. And then we're going to put um millings on top of it so that we don't have weeds and that it'll help the troughs not tear up that that area. Um and then we just still have to plant the trees. So not done yet, but we're almost there. Where actually is that on the property? Um if you're going down street the next drive over does that take care of a pile for home? Yes. The piles will get moved into the Great. Yes. That's great. So are there any questions? So the rental shortfall seems pretty significant. Is that So that's been explained. Um because of a change of how we were having staffing that um we had a little bit of a period where we had no coverage. So unfortunately we
032couldn't work with so that Yes. So we're trying to get back on track. So okay. Um do Am I asking for not asking for anything? Yeah, she's just giving the person in. Okay. So, there's no I have a E. Oh, okay. I'm sorry. You're good. I'm sorry. I'm rushing you. Yeah. So, 994B there is no report. 94 9.4 C is the student activity report and that balances to the bank. Um 9.4D 4D is the um stiff account and as of May 31st we re reinvested dividend of $1,983.91. Does anyone have any question on that? Okay. And then so 9.4E. So these are our regular transfers. Um the board might remember that we adjusted the policy so that we match what actually happened. So this is the last transfers for our quiring. Um and then in
033August you will be approving any transfers that I do for June to clean up year end items. Um so currently I'm presenting you 24 journal entries that total $75,45561. Okay. Do we have a motion to approve the tra trans transfers in the total amount of $75,45561? So moved. Okay, that's Scott Soyette. Um, do we have a second? Second marks. Um, any other discussion on the transfers? Just that last last month's explanation was very helpful. This time I'm actually reading them and understanding. I'm glad I could help. Okay. All in favor? I I opposed. Anyone abstain? Okay. So, we didn't have any subcommittee meetings in the month um after the May board meeting. So, there are no reports there. Brings us to uh item 10 on the agenda, theformational items. Yeah. So, I mean, we've kind
034of highlighted the importantformational items for what we have coming up. Over the past couple weeks, we've had uh different recognition ceremonies, awards ceremonies at both the middle school and the high school for the individual teams. And then obviously at the high school, they did the awards night. Um we've got a lot of things going on just as we wrap up the school year. Today was our last full day of school. We go into our exam schedule and and uh and half days uh starting tomorrow. and then uh the big things of uh promotion ceremony and uh a graduation and all of the exciting events that lead up to that. So uh it's got a busy week crammed into the next four days for sure. Where is the the soft where the commotion? So if you're
035look if you're looking at the front of the high school entrance, it's to the it's to the right. You go around to the right side of the building around the visitor park. Uh past the visitor parking lot. It's actually adjacent to staff parking. Oh, okay. Staff parking lots on that side. Thank you. Sure. On that side of the school, it's the closest athletic field to W. Oh, that's Maybe you never used it before. It's actually Yeah. Yeah. Oh, okay. Well, that's why I know you don't see it. Um, and then just as far as 10.2 for student discipline reports, the the enclosures are in the board packet. that I have a a general question for Eva on some of the finances the um the stiff account right we added money to that two years ago
036if I remember correctly I believe we added twice okay we did add when we had some available and I don't think that this coming school year we'll have the opportunity to do so but at the same time we're not we're going to have to move money out to pay bills so it's just a holding for the that's what I was going was getting to is I anticipated to You'd probably need to pull money from that. Okay. Are we emptying it? I hope so. Okay. Gotcha. I don't like to empty bank. That's what it is. Especially those that, you know, money. Thank you. I have a question that I haven't noticed before is the the red green red team, gold team, green team. My kids went to school here. I remember that the middle school. But
037what is the inquiry team? I will now ask Dr. Sheri to give a much thorough much more thorough explanation that I' that I could I could certainly give to Dr. So the inquiry team is also known as the orange team. Okay. And it's a special it's a special program that was developed about a little over 10 years ago on the team as well as one of our math teachers. It's a c it's similar to the other teams as a core core group of teachers. Um they do uh project based learning. They incorporate the curriculum interdisciplinary curriculum uh projects as you saw tonight on a regular basis throughout the year. U very they follow the same curriculum as the other teams but they just do it in a different way. Are they the students self- selected
038or just random? Students um apply to the academy and every year take about 35 students. Some years we get 35 and some years we get six. It just depends on the year and they stay for seventh and eighth grade. Seventh and eighth grade. That's the idea. There are some there are a few kids that it's not not the road for them. So they will opt out in eighth grade and we do take some eighth graders. We have about three eighth graders coming on uh next year with sort of a balance. My children both both participated in it. So I speak I can speak highly of it. Yeah. I guess we're Oh, just I think we should record this. Okay. Anything else before we move on? All right. Do we have a motion to enter into
039executive session to discuss the superintendent's evaluation? And would like to invite Colin in for the first portion of the executive session. I'm think that is Mike Bullier. Do we have a second? I'll second. Mike Sharon. Mike Sharon. All in favor? I. Anyone opposed? Anyone abstain? Heather. Yep. I don't know if you guys can hear me. Unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to stay for the executive session. Okay. Can you hear me? Yeah. Barely. Yeah. Better. Exactly. All right. So, we're executive. Yeah.