4/26/21 BOE Monthly Meeting

001all right everyone we're live great uh we have a quorum um like to call this meeting to order it's the april monthly meeting of the western board of education and we start uh with the pledge 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 thank you um before we get started uh just a a public uh public service announcement to those listening in um voting for the the town and school operating budget um and the capital budget um resumes on saturday at town hall from um i guess it's 12 to 8. um and if you can't make it on saturday you can go from nine to twelve this week and pick up

002an application for an absentee ballot um so if you haven't voted please go out and vote for the budget all right uh let's start uh the agenda with the recognition ken sure and i'm going to ask lisa to join in on this because this is the high school pto that has been very generous and providing some vex uh control systems for us so lisa thank you ken we are really very grateful to the pto for um helping us purchase these um what they're called vex v5 kits and basically they are um key technology that we need for our project lead the way program specifically computer integrated manufacturing principles of engineering um project lead the way upgraded to this new robotics platform and the kits are are on the expensive side they're about 600 um dollars

003each so we are really so grateful that the pto um purchased six new kits for us um we expect them any day now um frankly they were back ordered because of the high demand every stem high school in uh the country is trying to get them but um as soon as they arrive they will be put to good use so we thank the pto for continuing to support our stem program here and that's why quite frankly we're in the top 200 stem high schools in the country yeah um i'd like to second what lisa said uh thank you pto for everything you do um your time your commitment and and your uh your treasury um every bit of it goes to uh incredibly good use in the district and thank you for everything you do

004um can we have a motion anyone move that the western board of education recognized the donation of three thousand six hundred and eighty dollars from the westin high school pto for the purchase of six v vex v5 control systems for the pltw program have a second second any comment okay all in favor bye ruby hi gina hi taffy hi hillary hi melissa hi victor hi tony all opposed motion passes thanks again pto um approval of minutes can i have a motion um moves at the western board of education approve the minutes from march 2021 special meeting and the march 15 2021 executive session and regular session have a second second emmy any comments proposed edits to the meetings to the minutes okay all in favor bye ruby hi hillary hi gina hi melissa hi victor

005hi tony all opposed okay motion passes uh june do we have public comment this evening no there's uh no public comment was put forth okay uh student reps i just see ava on um so take it away hi um natalie had a tennis match today so it's just me um but a lot of things have been going on most importantly we go back fully on may 3rd which is really exciting a little nerve-wracking because you know we haven't really been full back but i know a lot i was talking to a lot of students and everyone's saying that's just a nice sense of normality that we really haven't had um so it's nice to end um in the year on a positive note um aps are right around the corner and this year they're going

006to be held at uh norfield church if you don't have extra time that's just because we needed the extra space um and honestly i think it works a lot better it's sometimes a little bit of a pain to kind of walk all the way around the gym especially because the gym is kind of like at the center of the school so um that's just going to be nice and especially because we need the gyms for lunch um since we are going to be eating in school now um senior internships uh for the seniors we get three um choices as to what we get to do it's rather a regular internship a portfolio or a do-it-yourself project another kind of improvement um again i was talking to a lot of my fellow classmates and they like

007the option of getting to kind of choose what you want to do just because especially this year finding a coveted safe internship can be particularly difficult um but kind of if you want to be more coveted safe the do-it-yourself project and portfolio are awesome options to do as well um prom is also going to be on may 14th the admin and student government has worked really really hard to make this work and do it in as safe and kind of a normal way as possible uh we've kind of found a way to make it covered safe mass required um you're gonna have assigned tables to sit and eat at um and things like that but again like right now the seniors are really going to take whatever whenever we get and we're just so happy

008that we get a prom especially because last year seniors didn't get that um we are also planning senior activities um a senior picnic kind of tvd on the details as of right now but um again the the administration is really working with us to make that work with some food trucks and games um for the senior class homecoming uh doing a powderpuff game for just juniors and seniors just for covered purposes but um doing that and then a mock homecoming week at the end of the year the warm weather is allowing us to do a lot more which is really nice and it's allowing us to end the year on a really positive note um graduation we want to thank everyone who's involved in graduation planning natalie and i talked about this just to make

009it work uh student government isn't as involved in planning graduation um but we do kind of get the first wind as to what is going on and we want to say thank you for everything um it's a lot of planning to make it work and have like a semi-normal graduation but um we're really really excited and then lastly um this friday is mayday for the seniors um just kind of a smaller thing but it's really exciting because um most seniors and most of us know where we're going to be going next year so yeah that's that's about it threw a lot out there pretty fast but we've been pretty busy planning that yeah it sounds like there's a lot of um exciting things planned and it's it's great that um the year is ending up

010so that at least you can you know be together as you head into the end of the year you know exactly thank you any um any questions from the board thanks for the update ava of course all right um new business ken okay i see under new business we have a retirement we have kim koos our assistant principal at hurlbut a long-time dedicated employee who has indicated that she is retiring at the end of this school year on june 30th and so that's before the board and just wanted to just thank kim you know for all her dedication hard work had the pleasure of working with her as the pe in health cil and her role as assistant principal so tony the board would i guess accept the uh resignation uh effective june 30th for

011kim koos yeah um yeah let's uh let's have a motion move that the western board of education recognized the retirement of ms kimberly koos assistant principal hurlbutt elementary school effective june 30th you have a second jackie um i i on behalf of the board want to also thank kim for her years of service or years of dedication to the district to our students and to the entire district i don't know if any other board members or uh administrations want to make a statement at this point i just think the one thing that always comes to mind when you think about kim is she just always had just a smile and always saw the brightness and everything and it didn't matter you know what you were discussing with her what challenge you were having to navigate

012she just did it with a certain amount of grace and she will definitely be missed here in the district all right all in favor gina i hi hilary i'm melissa hi ruby hi taffy hi good victor hi tony yeah opposed okay motion passes next item ken next item on the agenda tony is the non-renewal of long-term substitutes and this is an annual item by may 1st and we have a list of 14 long-term substitutes in the board's packet on meeting manager so we just want to thank uh especially the covid year these long-term subs who have really stepped up and come in and played a valuable role in ensuring continuity within the classroom some of these long-term subs have done multiple assignments over the course of the year so they're to be commended but as

013a matter of formality each year our uh long-term subs we we do send them a non renewal letter they certainly are welcome if in the future there are opportunities here in weston they certainly can apply so we thank them and um we ask that the the board vote on these non-renewals uh why don't you do all the personnel all the matters pertaining to personnel and then we'll we'll do one two three four four motions okay all right so then uh similarly we have a group of five building substitutes who uh again you know stepped in for us on a daily basis we have building substitutes in each of our buildings who we rely on when teachers are out for absences and some of those absences if they are you know a week or so they

014step right in they might be doing multiple assignments multiple uh different kinds of classrooms over the course of the year within the building and we rely heavily on them so again we have that group to thank and also we have sent them the the annual non-renewal notices and they certainly are when we um you know have building substitute positions in the fur in the future are welcome to uh apply again so then the last group uh we have uh three teachers uh as a result of reduction in force that are on the list of non-renewals and that is we do not have a position for them next year they were notified personally and in writing as a result of the reduction in number of teaching positions and you know a lot of that is just

015you know due to enrollment and the needs of the schools this is these are not and i just want to be clear on this these are not performance related um and these are uh certainly um you know valuable teachers that we we thank as well for their service so with that tony those are the three groups uh the there's no we have no names under the other category so these would be the three groups to vote on okay um so let's do motions for nine c d and e and uh there's nothing for 9x um so let's have a motion uh for 9c tony do you want us to name specifically the name no no i think we refer to the uh to the attach list which should be available um or if it isn't

016it should be available to the public no it is okay move that the superintendent of schools is directed to notify the following long-term substitute teachers that their contract of employment will not be renewed for the 2021-2022 school year second second thanks gina all in favor hi ruby hi hillary tap hi taffy hi gina hi victor hi tony all opposed okay motion passes let's go to the next move that the superintendent of schools is directed to notify the following long-term building substitute teachers that their contract of employment will not be renewed for the 2021 2022 school year have a second i can thanks taffy uh all in favor aye melissa hi gina hi ruby hi taffy hi hillary hi victor hi tony all opposed okay motion passes last one move that the superintendent of schools is

017directed to notify the following teachers that their contract of employment will not be renewed for the 2021-2022 school year have a second second thanks hillary all in favor aye ruby hi gina i'm melissa hi hillary hi victor hi tony all opposed okay motion passes uh we have uh nothing related to other non-renewal renewals um let's go to the next agenda item which is gauging process progress update um ken yeah the purpose of this informational item is to uh put on the radar for the board the upcoming annual instructional update that will take place on may 12th from 9 to 10 30 via soom through the curriculum committee and all board members are invited public is invited as well there will be as we refer to it gauging progress as part of that item where we

018will have some quantitative information regarding student progress in this covid year as well as some of the qualitative information from our curriculum leaders that you are used to from from year to year so that's going to be um you know a robust presentation we will get to you our commitment is to get the annual instructional update the document to you next wednesday the 5th and in talking with the curriculum committee a couple of weeks ago before break we're going to have a process where when you get that document the committee can can submit questions ahead of time we can respond to those so that you know we can be efficient with our time i'll be drafting an agenda for that meeting that taffy and i will look at and um you know we'll decide if

019that meets the needs of that um you know that session we really want to be able to uh you know zero in hone in on the you know the areas that you know the board wants more background information on and while we have the we'll have the full complement of sills on this on the zoom as well as our um principles will be there so um that's that's sort of the plan for gauging progress it's a it's a really important one we have had some periodic updates at curriculum committee but that has been um you know sort of smaller on a monthly basis this is a culminating presentation and at our last curriculum committee meeting in uh middle of april we um we provided information related to math math progress cohort data we will fold

020uh we'll fold that as well as literacy information into this this update as well so we should also add that we i should yeah ken i should also add to to let everyone know that we did tell um the staff to really not concentrate too hard on um you know creating a tome of information and slides and reports they have a lot going on and we just didn't want them to feel like they had to to you know create a thesis for us but rather continue to share information build on the curriculum meetings we've had thus far in one you know in one sort of summary session but to not spend too much time on reporting so they will report to us but i just emphasized to repurpose as much as they have and not

021spend too much time writing and i've shared that with them tap they really appreciated that and so um you know they're limiting any of their their responses um to the prompts to to less than a page you know bulleted you know as suggested you know just very very succinct um because obviously you know the real value is in the the conversation and the questions uh but we do you know for we do want to memorialize some of the um the key the high level points uh within the document but it'll be it'll be shorter than yeah and i think this is a particularly important uh meeting in terms of gaining progress given the year that we've had and my view is i think we probably need to be somewhat action-oriented given you know it's more

022it's probably more important to understand given um what we're seeing what are going to be the objectives for next year what are going to be the focus items for next year i think that should be you know while they're you know well we're not ready to embed them in our goals for next year but this should set the stage for those priority items that will be important goals for next year right yes and tony i'm glad you brought that up because that reminds me that um within the the um the summary for each discipline is you know very briefly high level accomplishments um but also those next steps uh is included in that so you'll see that all ahead of time and you can probe that and um um this is this is may 12th

023um it is committee meeting it's curriculum committee meeting it's open to the public um as well um good uh um tony tony to your point that this is um obviously top of mind for a lot of parents in the district um i know it's not common practice to record committee meetings um but since this is such a meaty topic and worthwhile i'm sure lots of parents will want to see this and for those who are working could we make an exception and record this meeting sure and and i i also was going to say that we should summarize um and and give an update um at the next monthly meeting at the may monthly meeting we don't have to go through the entire you know may 12th meeting but we should basically give a summary

024of what was uh what came out of that may 12th meeting yeah that was and well that that's right we can we can we can summarize and reference the youtube video of the meeting itself ruby i think that's a fine idea yeah absolutely okay that was that was the update okay uh thanks ken um more to come um public health guidelines i know bill was going to go through that i don't see him on yet um yeah we may want to come back to that one tony okay as he has that information if you don't mind sure uh schooling scenarios this is um i think um probably briefly go through to uh each of the schools and give an update on how things are going and also um maybe a little preview of of maybe

025some of the things that are planned for year-end as well great why why don't we start with um we'll uh change things up we'll start with with lisa uh you know the uh the center of campus and the high school because they they do have you know a change coming up on may 1st um with the full day for lunch correct yes that's correct so we will be um being in um you know in full day until 2 starting on may 3rd monday um everyone's very excited about it uh there's been some logistical things that we have to do uh as ava said we will be doing our uh ap exams those um students that have a standard administration without extra extra time we'll be at uh northfield and we do want to thank reverend

026uh wilson for that because um that's a big deal we need the space in the old gym for um lunch and that's normally where we have it so um that will uh the ap exams actually are over a three week period um it's uh ten days will be um at northfield having the tests there proctoring um but it's over a three week period and that's because as uh people are aware there are different windows this year to take it we wanted to give our students every opportunity to ensure their preparedness so we're looking forward to fullback any new clubs now can also start existing clubs had been starting and meeting um after school and we dismissed at 12 20 but now with the fullback we can also um have um you know clubs uh meet

027in the afternoon after school along with the athletics and the sport so we're excited about it um right now we are at about a 13 uh vdl voluntary distance learning um which is held steady pretty much since we started um uh back to all in a few weeks ago and um you know things are looking up so we're excited to a strong end of the year with all of our students in students are in the courtyards right now which is great to see so we have a lot of flex staff and we want to um thank andre santelli because i know it's been challenging kind of working back um into a full program at the high school we're almost there dr crock yep let's uh let's go to the middle school dan okay uh maybe

028we uh let's come back to dan uh patty okay um so uh things are going really well yeah we've been back in school for full time for a while so we're like a well oiled machine at this point i feel like we're almost back to uh except for the masks um and social distancing we're pretty back to normal um more and more of our remote learners are returning we are down to about 10 of our students who are distance learning um we even have some of our homeschoolers who are returning next week um so um that's been that's been nice to have to see more and more students coming back into our school um we started our state testing this week so that will um to be taking place over the next uh probably three

029weeks or so um and then we you know we work really closely with our um remote um learning students families so that giving them the choice of either taking the the tests in school coming in when we're doing it after schools on wednesdays uh after everybody else has left or i'm doing it remotely so we've worked closely with them to make sure that they have that choice um we are currently working on our end of the year activities and our transitions uh for our incoming uh third graders and for our fifth graders who are heading off to the middle school so i've been working with laura and with dan um for for both of those transition um um events um we really want to make sure that we really take time at the end of

030the year to celebrate because we really want to applaud how amazing our kids have been um this whole year and we really want to take time to celebrate so we're working on making sure that we do some really fun assemblies and events i know what we're back to we definitely have field day which is really nice um so uh those are that's where we are right um patty given given the hot real estate market is it still too early to tell i mean are you seeing any students trickling in and what are you feeling about next year i know it's early yet but what are you seeing so uh we have had students coming in over the last couple of weeks actually they're trickling in i had one start last monday um i have another

031one starting next next monday so that we are coming in i've also got i think we've got about six or seven students already on infosnap for next year um if all of the and i've checked i haven't spoken with laura but if all of the homeschoolers in second grade come back and i've already got four new third graders already enrolled for next year um we're about four students short of being 24 in every classroom as of right now wow so we are watching those numbers as i said i would do um to make sure that we um especially third grade is the one that's a close call yep wow good yep laura yeah so like patty we continue to be all in um and doing well it's very exciting to have everybody um inconsistently so

032we are like um the other school is still seeing rolling enrollment throughout we've had some new students start in the last couple weeks and we have more still coming even in may to start the year so our registrar has been very busy at the same time we're also working with families who are re-enrolling either returning from homeschooling some this year but quite a few for next year as well as our incoming kindergarten of course we're working on those registrations as we speak so busy end of the year we are planning our field day for the beginning of june and our end of the year celebrations will be classroom-based very similar to um the intermediate school and it really is a classroom celebration of all of the work they've done together and those class communities which

033are so powerful at the elementary level we have like just like wes have seen a tremendous increase in students returning from vdl to in-person learning i it seems like every day i'm getting a phone call or an email of somebody wanting to talk about or planning on returning and i think yeah currently we're at about 10 percent of our population still vdl but i anticipate that that will continue to decline as more and more students return to in-person learning um before the end of the school year so uh very busy place but everything's going well great dan thanks um sorry to have to go out of order um so again very similar to what uh patty and laura said we are um planning our end of the year celebrations uh we just met with our

034eighth grade pto rep and the eighth grade team leaders on friday uh so we are um planning an in-person moving up ceremony um right now it's tentatively scheduled for uh the 16th of june uh we are going to have a modified western warrior field day we didn't get to do that last year so we are planning to have our field day with the majority of the activities outdoors cohorted by team and by grade level we are also looking to have an eighth grade breakfast the morning after our moving up ceremony and um we were actually hoping to be able to pull off one eighth grade social since this group did not get to have the trip to philadelphia they didn't get to have um the field club day we are looking to schedule an outdoor

035um movie night just for the eighth grade um and we're looking to see if we can if we can pull that off safely in order to do that in terms of enrollment we are seeing new students as well we had two new students recently enrolled at uh at the middle school uh we have also continued to see students come off of our vdl roster as well and stabilize now right around 10 percent uh and i know that we have several more scheduled to come off vdl next week there were a couple families that really wanted to wait the two weeks after spring break in order to come back in person so we um this week uh and the notice already went out to our fifth grade families thanks to patti and her staff we do

036have our sixth grade rising sixth grade parent night it's going to be a zoom and we'll send a reminder out again thursday uh during the day but that'll be thursday evening seven o'clock if you zoom for all of our current fifth grade uh families just to learn more about the middle school i think that's an update tony just uh following on what was uh referenced in terms of vdl uh the board has received a recent update from bill that's it's you know march 10th we've had a 41 reduction in the number of students on vdl you heard laura say she's down to 10 percent of her students it's 10 at the intermediate school 10 percent of the middle school and 13 at the high school so we've uh we've really seen uh that reduction um

037and we're glad that's great it's back yeah that's great news yeah i think you know we have to keep our eyes on the enrollment now because this is one of those years where uh the you know demographers you know it's anybody's guess and uh um you know the combination of new people moving into town and um the students that were homeschooled or went to other schools for the year you know potentially coming back we should probably just keep a close eye on that so if we have to take corrective actions we do it sooner versus later and if i may sorry to jump in but i in the note i sent to the board hopefully you saw as an email we can post it with this meeting if that's helpful in this section friday we'll

038be back to you with the grade by grade update so you can see then very specifically uh what the enrollment shifts have been at each grade level not just at the building level yeah any uh any questions from uh from the board nope thanks thanks for the update uh bill we're gonna go back we've skipped over the public health guidelines uh update so maybe um maybe you can you can take that now sure um i think the good news is there's not a lot to say um i did do i'm doing regular updates and the metrics uh this is the first time i'll go very specifically to those if the metrics that i shared friday tell the following themes we're doing really well within the westin schools last week we had almost no cases we

039had one today i don't think it led to a lot of quarantine so that's good so our numbers even going into tuesday going you know since the break we're in really good place and recall there was a lot of anxiety about could you open full in after the break and i'm glad we persisted because our most immediate metrics within our district have been really really good last week weston as a town saw a drop we you know it tends to be an up and down a county is holding steady at a fairly high rate in the 30s positivity is bouncing around but it's it's it's at a plateau the public health medical experts and every wednesday we're with them several people join me in that conversation which now is very important to their legs on

040that for next year uh i think as tracy huzan fills in all the time would say that you know mark and laura are nervous they are worried uh laura and her practice is seeing uh an uptick but they both are be clear pleased with what we're doing they're pleased that we're in a full return they're pleased with our mitigating work and all the rest so you know in terms of where we are as we look into the fall and this is really i think you know the strength of you having your new super coming from within the district so expert on here in the region i think the real discussion is going to be around which this discussion you may already have had around what's the state going to require in terms of schooling scenarios

041relative to the public health concern or how much flexibility and and where does that decision sit right now from a public health metrics standpoint we're in good shape we've got i think good systems in place our quarantine length is at the right place how we're dealing with the contact tracing is the right place we're trying to be very focused on that minimize and now with a very high rate of vaccinations once you're two weeks past that final dose you get a get out of quarantine card uh be you a student or a staff member so in the midst of something that's still grim internationally and still a challenge for us nationally you know we're i don't want to jinx us with the following but we're in a pretty good place for managing what can be

042such a serious issue and i know for principals or others or tracy or any of those if you just want to comment a bit or add to thanks phil any questions from the board members all right thank you um update on our diversity equity and inclusion initiatives um board had a workshop on friday the 23rd it was a public workshop um one of several that that our plan around diversity equity and inclusion this was really a planning workshop to basically level set where we are in terms of our initiatives around curriculum uh policy and and staffing and um to basically start looking at how we actually weave uh diversity equity and inclusion um into our goal setting uh this summer um so i thought it was a good session i i thought we made a

043really good start and starting to frame the issues um as a prelude to our goal setting in the summer we'll include specific topics around diversity equity and inclusion in our goal setting and we've also started down the road as a board uh in creating a dei statement that represents our values and also drives drives our actions so um thought it was a good start um and there's a lot more to come the the i think the work is going to be how we effectively weave diversity equity and inclusion um and as a filter in driving uh what we do as a district um so more to come on the topic i don't know if other board members uh want to comment i thought it was a great start too um lisa sent us all through

044a great exercise to begin to sort of craft what we believed were our highest priorities and values around this so i think it was a great start as well you covered it tony good if there's uh there's nothing else let's move to the next topic um the next two topics uh are very exciting calendar calendar topics um that i don't know bill are you going to take us through that uh well ken and i arm wrestled and i won so he gets to take you through it you know every time we go through calendars um i i can't help but think of dan mcneal who this was his favorite topic uh was working on the calendar so he might even be listening in tonight actually well by zoom you could appoint him as the honorary

045chair going forward of the calendar work yeah well tony you know we have fun on the calendar committee we have a representative group hillary is a part of it representing the board we have the w.a.a wta afscme the pto uh represented and we met twice prior to this meeting the first time to just kind of review calendars and start to think about are there any questions about the calendars things that we need to obtain feedback on and uh so the various groups went back to their uh their their groups and uh brought back feedback and then afterwards we culminated in this recommendation that we have here which uh this is only a first so think of it in terms of policies like the first read and then we'll come back you know another month and

046you can you know set your calendar but the nice thing about the calendars is we you know we're looking out um you know uh next year but then the year after as well 22 23 and we have another chance to come back and if we need to make a minor adjustment like you'll see here for 2122 that we're uh suggesting to you so i can take us through what would be most helpful here i mean i can [Music] i think for 20 21 22 i could just tell you that you know this is your already approved calendar it's very similar in many respects to what we've had in recent years but the one change that the committee felt they would make it's very minor it's around the parent conferences but rather starting the parent conferences

047on november 1st the morning after halloween they felt you know move that to the third fourth and the fifth after election day that was the one recommendation there um that i just wanted to highlight for you so um otherwise the calendar you know as was adopted last year there were there were no other recommendations so i'll just pause if there's any questions about the 21 22 calendar um banner you have a quick question remind me why we start prior to labor day great question ruby and you know obviously we have um 180 days for students typically this year was 177 and in westin there's always the goal of trying to end early enough in june that if we get uh you know five six snow days that we still can end before that very final

048week of june um and and so mixed into that is the fact that we also have seven teacher days three that we place at the beginning of the year to get ready for school and then there are uh there are three days that are within the school calendar for ongoing professional development and then you know we have one day at the very end of the year um so so you know it's just a matter of um you know if we if we always started after labor day we would be going to the very end of june when you factor in snow days and now the flexibility that we had for snow days this year ruby we're not you know we'd like to see you know you know some some of the positives of that you

049know potentially could uh continue but we're not hearing that we have that flexibility for next year i'm sorry so you're saying you're not hearing from the state yeah that they will honor remote days as part of the as part of the mandated 180 days correct dan might have even more information on that because he's been heavily tied in with this and bill as well is it still on the table for discussion or has the state already just said no no right now right now from what i am understanding sorry ken it's it they're taking feedback and are gathering information before they make a decision whether to move forward with it so they they really are looking at a multitude of factors including participation rates during snow days how many districts elected to do to use

050remote days of snow days what was the percentage some districts said you know we're going to take the first four days of snow days and then every day after that so there's a lot of factors so they haven't definitively said no but they also haven't said boo about whether they're going to continue next year i wish i could give you a better answer no no i appreciate that i definitely wanted it to be more objective the reason why we're not doing it to be more objective versus subjective for this district only but i just think from if if the calendar is still open for discussion i would just um have you guys seriously consider uh a post labor day start and here's my reason i just think a lot of you know we families have

051been cooped up for the past year i think there is going to be there's pent-up travel demand right pent-up travel urge from this past year and a half and i think a lot of families are going to be taking advantage of that this summer now that majority of them will have their second shot um and i just think you know before a long weekend to just start three days prior half days it's just it's you know i i don't know i just i just feel like let's just do the right thing here and and start post labor day but that's that's my view yeah the the only um i guess there was some sensitivity around making sure that you didn't go too far in june especially with um students going away to camp and things

052like that um i thought that there was um there was always you know wanted to give you know if you were if you were concerned about one end of the calendar or the other that you didn't want to find your we didn't want to find ourselves heading too far into the end of june um but but um i don't know others might have um but i i i agree ruby i mean um i would i yeah i would say and and i'm totally this is speculating here that more families would rather have that entire time of that big chunk of labor day off to continue their travel and and to kind of have a one last hurrah for the summer versus uh capitalizing on an earlier june date but i could be totally wrong yeah

053ruby i hear that and i'm just looking at the calendar and i see before labor day which is uh september 6th there's we start on august 26th so there's one two three four five six seven days before labor day and um so if we were to put those at the end of the year you're really then i think looking at um you're looking at the 20th being the last day if you're adding seven days on uh to the to the end there so just and also just be aware that if we get too out of line with our start date compared to most other schools significant portion of your high schoolers will have to be back because high school sports will be starting up so it's really it's um you know because those are state

054mandated begin practice dates and competition dates and if we're too out of whack with other districts while i recognize weston as its own self when we manage ourselves it kind of you're only kind of giving a benefit to us a certain group of students does any other district around us start after labor day um well you know not not that i'm not that i'm aware of i mean new york city schools start after labor day but here in fairfield county um unless there's a construction issue or something like that generally they're getting a start the end of august um or early september just before labor day i mean that's that's what i've seen you know my kids in a neighboring district my wife who works in another fairfield county district see similar calendars um so

055i mean the only the only other thing i could you know suggest to you as a board is to with to ruby's point uh maybe not after labor day but if you looked you know a little later i mean june june uh ninth the last day of school is is a fairly early release there's still some flexibility there in june um but uh you know you could you could look at that instead of maybe a um 26th start you could you could look at maybe a few days you know so you get through that that weekend there in in august and you start potentially a little later on the on the first of september and get get a few days in before labor day but to have seven to start you know to add seven

056to the end of the year you really be tight and you'll be right there at the end if we don't get that flexibility from from the state well why don't you see what you i mean this is a discussion you're still working on the final final calendar so see what you know see what some reasonable options might look like okay so for so you've already approved this calendar but in light of covet is what you're saying is consider oh i thought this was there's a discussion on proposed 2223. so this is 21 20. oh okay i'm sorry uh well it's the start but it's the start date of 22 22-23 is what ruby's asking about right when he won 222 i think she's interested oh i was asking for 21 22. oh okay but if

057that's a done deal i do it's more of a kind of as we move forward operationally again now that remote is is even in question in terms of well this will the state allow it or not do we just want a different way of of thinking about the calendar and the start date because i do know families who would love to to be able to continue traveling um up and through you know up until labor day yeah i thought we were talking about 22-23 actually i mean most districts in the region especially with labor day as late as the 6th of september they're going to be starting pre-labor day um i'm looking at some calendars now and for the next couple years with it falling that late if you're back into a second or third

058of september it might be to make it but it's certainly a reasonable question but just know that most because that's so late if you will in september one weekend it'd be very difficult for for them to start post labor day okay all right so i can um move on to the next calendar if that's that's helpful sure maybe it's better since i want to be clear which calendar we're talking about i will can you see that there's the 2122 we were talking about with the um start there they mean labor day is the sixth and then you have rosh hashanah there on the seventh so right all right but that was our that was that's the account that's been approved um the the new calendar that we've been uh forming for you does follow some

059similar patterns from uh previous years uh the start date is in here is a september first start date uh with the teacher days preceding it there was a great deal of discussion uh in the committee that you know the the two-day start to the week was beneficial to the elementary students the elementary representatives um you know we're we're advocating for that we incorporated that into the calendar uh in september there's obviously labor day you have on the 26th you have a jewish holiday with rosh hashanah then in october on the 5th columbus columbus day is a long weekend for students and families teachers this is a professional learning day and then in november as we typically had early november parent conferences election day the wednesday before thanksgiving has been a tradition in weston to be

060a day off in december we have the first of a couple of early release days for professional learning on the 7th and then there's just a an early release on the 23rd of december for the break then coming back in january the the federal holiday for new year's on the second we come back on the third martin luther king day on the 16th uh then in february we've followed the model though we did have discussions about you know you know full february breaks which districts have full february breaks what would be the impact of that ultimately the committee landed on keeping this break here even considered well what if we had a march break and maybe a long weekend in april that was something brought forth by the wta president as an idea we looked

061at it but ultimately we landed with this long weekend approach around president's day then uh in march we come back to uh parent conferences at the k5 level and a professional learning day on the 20th and then the last part of the year in april and this is this is something that you know likely you're going to want to take a look at the placement of the april break um and that i think is something where you know we don't know where other districts are at this point because you know we're generally pretty early with this calendar uh passover begins on uh april 5th um good friday on the 7th and then you know that there's a long weekend there so i mean one thought is you could incorporate it in with the seventh or

062you can even push it out uh to the 17th but we kind of landed in the middle with the week of the ten then in may memorial day and then ending a last day for students on the 15th last day for teachers on the 16th uh giving about you know six days for students in case of inclement med weather and again you know hoping for some possibility of flexibility um from the state on remote days for inclement weather i have a couple of questions uh ken if i may um first i don't think we're calling it columbus day anymore or if we are i don't think we should um i'm just a silly note perhaps for some but i think it should be indigenous people's day and we should probably that you brought that up

063yep okay and secondly i just if we can make that edit and secondly um i'm gonna ask kind of a question like ruby's which um and and this is context you'll have to remind me of um i seem to remember we used to have a long march break as our spring break and not a week or what people take as a week in february because they just take it and a week in april and can you a remind me why that changed i think it was two weeks in march or maybe it was okay and secondly just my opinion on this is just that april mid to late april is the singular worst time for spring break because you know it's too hot to ski or it's too late to ski and it's too hot

064to go south so i'm just saying it has there been any rationale or any pushback on having you know the one big long break in the whole winter january to june in april answer your first question we did have a march break oh i think it was during colleen's tenure and i think it was related to um boy i you know i can't recall the reasoning for it but it was a one-year uh change that we had made so that may be what you're thinking of um okay but uh you know most years it's been either you know a february and an april break we've moved away in you know recent history away from a full april break um excuse me a full february break i meant to say but there was discussion hillary can

065can also you know chime in we we um we looked at you know what would a march break look like um there wasn't a there wasn't a lot of support for it except you know i think there was you know one member of the committee who who thought um you know let's put that idea out there see if it makes sense um but the committee ultimately felt having uh you know that period of time from march with a break all the way to the end of the year was a long long period of time and then the idea of um you know february the february break being a full week people said well you know with inclement weather you know you you're already going to lose continuity of learning so you don't need necessarily a

066full break there um but that was you know something some of the discussion i don't know hillary if you want to chime in at all it just no i i you just told them everything that we talked about i mean i think the march break idea was almost more of like an exercise of let's put it out there just so we you know cross every t and dot every eye i don't know that really there was a lot of reception but everybody certainly considered it and i would just like to add that having a break no i'm not saying it needs to be a full week but having some sort of break in april post final college decisions is very beneficial for kids to be able to go visit schools that they may have been

067admitted to before they make their final admissions decisions okay someone brought that up all right it just it's uh another question does february i mean i know just from friends and neighbors that people take the whole week off in february i mean it's a lost week academically for a lot of people because they've got the thursday friday saturday sunday monday so they also take the wednesday and sometimes the tuesday and if they're you know no high-stakes stuff going on in school they'll take the monday right they'd take it as a week was there any discussion in the meeting about that and how to mitigate that well we have looked at those numbers in the past and they they haven't yeah you know at least the high school might be able to chime in and others

068um but we have you know when we had the the early release on that day before uh the break um you know we did see the numbers higher but but not not when it was a you know a three-day week not so much i mean there are some but yes um i mean i can we can try to bring you that data if that's helpful in making it no no it's not necessary it's not necessary thank you ken that i'm missing or an extra half pd day between the two yeah you're right i don't see it there was one there was one other it's not um it's a good catch we will update that it's yeah i think it was supposed to be in january at the very end of january yeah but i had

069an early release um right an early release it wasn't a full day we have all seven um full day pvs on here for teacher days i should say so we can update that so i guess next step is um sorry i have one more question i i can't see everyone's face because i've got the screen can you can you just put up um please the uh 2022 no 2021 22 calendar again please okay so we're saying that school that children are back in school on the 26th and the last day of school is projected for june 9th right so is there an opportunity to reopen the discussion on this year can i add one thing which is that when you go to june 9th you have to count the seven days and you have to

070count five snow days so it's really not the 20th if you go down it'd be like the 27th if we add all that in you mean it's not the ninth it is more like the the so so dan when are we going when is the state i'm sure they're going to bundle all of this together right in terms of what the state is going to make a decision on vdl and etc do we have some sort of understanding when they're gonna make these decisions i mean because it's that to me is a no-brainer like we're we're asking the children to come in on the 26th of august and yet we have a june 9th that's the earliest i've ever seen a a end of date right so i would think if they're going to honor

071remote days i think we probably have some flexibility there it really comes down to an equity issue and how school districts to find remote learning days so a district like us we we were in the position that we were able to fully utilize technology k-12 but they have to take into account other districts so we're all kind of pressing on them to hurry up and make a decision we need to know yes or no either way but you know i wish i could give you an answer say that they are going to tell us before the end of you know before june 30th but they're silent right now out of bill i don't know if you've heard anything on state calls yeah i mean it relates to the i i'm not sure it's larger or

072smaller but it relates to a larger question of what's going to be required or not for remote mode next year and i've been trying to update the board almost conversationally to keep you very close to it as with the leadership team they've not what it appears going to happen for a moment relates to the question about snow days it appears that the state's going to say district it's up to each of you but they're going to say that with parameters and guard rails and as of the friday conversation with all the supers nobody's willing to take a planning step so we know what the guard rails and parameters are going to be i think that then does relate to the snow day or inclement weather day trade-off and i think dan hit the nail on

073the head they're looking at 160 districts great diversity in terms of wherewithal and trying to balance that out um i can press on that as well now that's been a little quieter the inclement weather issue because the other one's so big and it's really substantially the question of how we're going to run school in the fall and what's the state going to tell us we can or can't do so we'll keep pressing ruby i did do a scan of six other districts right around us and everybody has the same sequence of starting in late august first day back that doesn't mean weston can't do it differently but i i looked at darian wilton greenwich new canaan um and one other and they're all right where we are for both of these years but again it

074doesn't mean that weston can't do it differently but bill are they are they right where we are a week and a half before labor day or are they the i seem to remember well yeah i just look at them they're all right there on the 26th to 27th yeah because i you know i think it would be worth looking into since june 9th is so early of if we can't get all the way to the labor day at least at least starting the 30th or the 31st and um pushing the ninth back a little bit i i agree with ruby i don't remember ever getting out that that early and um i think the time is more valuable for families in august yeah the pivot on that uh is you then have to assume you

075have no inclement weather days or the state's going to say you can use a remote for inclement weather days because we've at least two or three inclement weather days which isn't just snow it could include other issues um so it put it it does get pushed back some but i think it's you know working you know i think the risk of you know i this is purely intuition not based on any facts right um it appears that the risk of giving giving families another weekend and starting on the 30th is probably small but that's that's not based on any data well also can i ask are are and you can just let me know if you haven't had time to think about this but i would assume so that if the state says it's up

076to to the district the investment that we have made um in technology from a training standpoint and a um software standpoint we're gonna say we're gonna we're gonna take it right we're going to we're going to use there's a there's a bigger issue here well just on just there's a there's a much bigger issue and it's not just related to you know it's not just inclement weather yeah yeah yeah no i get it i get it i'm just saying that it's it is um i we should have that public discussion when when whenever the state you know yeah their decision that's all right my my i could be completely wrong my country is on inclement weather it will be mandatory statewide as it's handled because that gets into attendance days and counting days in school

077uh the other what appears to be quite clear is they're going to say each district decide what we're all waiting on is what those parameters are um and that but i don't think we want to get into guessing on that bigger issue of schooling scenarios we have guides from the state uh your administrative team is ready once we know the answer they're ready to go to work and talk with the board the parents everybody about the approach on on that question um i would be very surprised though if on the inclement weather one they left that completely up to as or as opposed you could use several days or some days but again we're waiting on the state and we keep pressing now just looking at the counters some of the other dishes i've looked

078at have pushed it to the 30th maybe the first but they haven't gone post labor day might i suggest that between now and the next meeting i could come back with a middle ground uh approach to the start where you know i i wouldn't say necessarily the 30th because i would hear from elementary staff that the five-day start to them with the kids you know they they'd like a shorter week to start but you know maybe something around you know the 31st um or the first just seeing where we end up because i do think if you look at the end of the calendar you really wouldn't want to go any further than the you know the 14th or 15th 15th maybe so i can work something up if tony yeah i think that makes

079sense okay but i think you know the sooner you can make a decision next month the better so people know to make plans to take advantage of any additional flexibility all right um one move to the next topic um bill early retirement so we uh posted with this uh item and it was a little later this afternoon um and if you haven't had a chance to look through we can walk you through it uh um i don't know phil if you want me to start and then can you and phil can kind of backfill on this sure brother you can start off okay so um we hope the memo is written so it gives you as a board the background material um the board excuse me the finance committee looked at this topic in march

080uh quite thoroughly not in this memo for you was at that point the administration was not recommending pursuing this we saw the savings uh net benefit financially and felt for several reasons it was you know we weren't recommending it but we were close on that so good good discussion good questions from the finance committee which they can speak to which led us as administration to say we hear you and so let's proceed uh because you see in the memo this question was brought to us by the wta they were hoping that this would be a year to again offer the early retirement part of the reason we weren't immediately recommending it was the sequencing we've now had several of these over a fairly tight time frame and we also are still paying out a previous

081one usually these are spaced out a bit more but we did listen to the union we clearly listened to the finance committee uh we put the program together we put it out there it's structured very carefully uh this time it's within mla this is a topic for informal collective bargaining we handled that correctly and appropriately we put it out as it says in the memo as of the friday deadline at four o'clock seven staff had signed on and committed to retirement which gives us a financial and net financial savings that phil can speak to some we want to stress as with all e-rips this is an estimate we think it's a solid estimate but as phil would ask us to remember uh once we're now into posting and hiring the new seven because these are

082seven positions we need um we hope and we can work towards a savings um but you have to really then sort out who's in your pool we're optimistic we can get there um this is actually not an item that requires board action but it's critical that the board be fully aware of what's occurring so that's why the finance committee talked about it and now we're bringing it to the full board at this time the chair endorsed that um timing matters because assuming the board and there may be lots of questions we look forward to that assuming the board agrees with this we would tomorrow's um i would write and accept the seven resignations you as a board as standard practice would acknowledge those at the main meeting but that allows us tomorrow to begin posting

083for these positions and puts us in a much better place of getting that right balance of talent and to help the district financially so i don't know if phil if you want to add anything to this and then ken from an hr perspective want to add anything and then let's open up for questions and discussion excuse me discussion um bill there's really i'm not quite sure anything to add at this point um we can um wait first i'm not quite sure if ken has any comments regarding the hr aspect phil phil um you know one of the things is that um the every every year budget season when we talk about turnover savings and eric everybody's kind of eyes glaze over a little bit because not everyone understands all the different uh ins and outs

084so maybe just spend a second or so just explaining how this all works um you have a nice you know you have a nice table there but you don't have to go through a huge amount of detail but maybe just take take a second to to talk about how the savings are you know what happens this year and then what happens in subsequent years sure all right maybe i should just go to the um to the schedule or just yeah that would be perfect yeah all right can everyone see this yeah okay good all right so just let me go by the column so the current europe that we have in every era that we will be had for future for future years the payment for the e-rep is based on the current salary in

085the current fiscal year so this will be the fy 21 salary the current plan for the europe is that each employee who who have enrolled will get 50 of their annual salary for in this case off their fy 21 salary which will be paid out in three equal installments 20 22 20 22 23 i'm sorry september of 21 22 and then 23 for the final year all right so and then we have here for the budgeted so it's a little bit different this year because we have we're very we're pretty much at the very end of the budget process so i listed the fy 22 salaries because this is pretty this was our starting point software 22 is a salaries that we have currently budgeted anticipated savings and this sort of kind of ties into

086into the turnover savings in any given year regardless of whether you're in a private or the public sector you will have people who for whatever reason they may leave or they may resign or they may retire the difference or the difference between their current salary and their replacement salaries and generally what we refer to as the turnover savings um so in in this respect um if you look at the seven that we have that we have here we will have a um turn savings before e-repayment our anticipated let me start over fy22 salary of 805 000. we anticipate that all things being equal we should be able to replace the salary um with people or on the wta step level m a step seven and um we can go into that a little bit more

087but we'll have to pull up the the w2a salary contract and look at the salary schedule schedule there so we will have salary savings between our fy 22 salaries and the anticipated replacement of 286 thousand dollars now from that we will definitely need to take out from that from the savings payments um for the e-rep of 130 and that will end up with our net savings of a hundred and fifty six thousand dollars um so in addition to that it's also fight commitment and everything else but let me let's keep that out of the equation for one quick minute now when you when when you think about this right you'll say okay if i'm if i'm saving 156 000 or 150 there about why am i only seeing savings of 35 000 another way to

088think about this is that we plan so to speak for three for three retirement resignation which will net us are roughly 115 000 what we have for this year or what we have based on the europe is four additional individuals who will be adding so much so to speak for the turnover savings so the turnover service is really going from 115 to roughly 150 000 and the net savings of that is 35 000 so in the first year which will be in um in fy 22 that will become a part of your base budget and so your base budget will start at 130 and in future years it will just pretty much be a year of a year flat flat year over year change for fy 2023 we will see savings roughly at um all

089things all things being equal of roughly a point two eight percent are rough and approximately a hundred and fifty or so thousand dollars for each of the each year going forward all things being equal that may have confused everyone but if there's any other questions or any clarifications that's needed let me know please any questions on the schedule clarification yeah the 115 turnover savings that's that's the combined turnover savings that we will have in the that's the before the e-rep the turnover savings that we currently have that is correct in our fy22 budget right right and what we're doing is we're adding the and so we're basically now adding the 150 which is what the one time basically the one time payment that we have to make that basically then um reduces it to 35

090540 but that's just for one year that's for for 22 right that is that is for 22. in 23 you will have more offer cost avoidance in in fy 23 which will be a benefit in fy 23 you'll have roughly about 150 000 cost avoidance which will help overall budget and this is net this is after factoring in payments for europe and everything else all right okay any questions i if there are no questions i might say in conclusion i mean i think for a few board members and for the past e-rips we've actually given this a little more board attention and i think that's been a plus year i know gina you might comment on that i mean we we you know the administration had a point of view we listened to the union

091with us and the board i think we've ended up with something that gives us a good benefit uh and allows uh seven long time employees who worked very very hard for this district we're not mentioning who they are you'll learn later but work very very hard giving them a chance to move on in a way that is a benefit to them and a benefit to us in the district and in all sincerity i wanna you know thank the finance committee for listening and and frankly pushing back in a good way uh that led us to where we are um and again if some of these things are odd as to what's a board decision or not but we need to keep you informed it's an mra struck uh that's and where it's all well put

092together very well positioned and through the finance committee we'll keep you closely updated on how that uh net savings plays out yeah i mean that was a very collaborative meeting to reach a point of moving forward with this potential offer where do we stand with with ask me as it relates to this was there a request from ask me to consider this there's there's not a request at this point from ask me we've we've run those numbers in case there has been i think it's fair to say wah had made an inquiry we ran those numbers and they understand it's just not affordable for the district by contract a law employee the replacement employee comes in at 90 percent of the departing uh individual and you can see on phil's very helpful chart that uh

093that's not 90 uh you don't know you're going to land there but but you just are given uh much more flexibility so it was excellent that hua asked it's a i love good questions it was a question to ask and we didn't bring that into the finance committee because we'd already run the numbers and the margin was just too tight to get uh the savings meaning you don't go into these and if you create a cost center you go into these to create a savings um and i've met subsequently with the wild leadership they understand uh you know they have members who would appreciate this opportunity but it's just not financially possible going to the ask me one they've not asked yet but we have run those numbers and i don't know if phil well

094we can i don't think we need to discuss it tonight but we've run those numbers just in case their margins are also not they don't give the same flexibility as as to the wta but it's a little less tight if you will than uh than what uh bill just to clarify i have not run any numbers for f4 asked me okay we're ready to run them if asked me to ask okay thank you all right all right thanks bill um the next topic is end of year update i don't know what your plans were for discussion there bill um i don't know sorry i was out for the schooling scenario discussion and that was really more which may have been covered for each of the schools to talk about how we're handling the end of

095year the one definite central office piece is we have a date on the calendar thank you community communications committee for making sure we did that before meredith left she got that on the calendar so we it will be zoom based but we'll have a zoom based early june i think on the exact day maybe june 7th is somewhere in my head but it's locked down is a zoom based celebration of of students it's mostly student sometimes staff who've had recognitions and deserve celebration from the board so while we've had more flexibility uh in terms of what can be done in person something like this i think is still best handled via zoom so from a central office standpoint we're working on that we're planning that i think the other part of this you may or

096may not have covered but it was school by school the other critical end of the year pieces obviously most important to high school relative to you know prom and graduation but i if you talked about already that's what was this piece if not now's the time i think we covered that a lot uh in the schooling scenarios right yep i don't know if there's anything else to say on that no okay um phil uh i think you're next up on a few uh financial items one is the budget litigation and then the financial update it's actually three parts tony um it says the the end of your fy20 benefit update really was that's part of the financial update so update it's an um an update to the full board regarding our fy22 mitigating plan okay

097and also the financial update for for fy20 okay all right real quick just stepping through many as many agenda items as you'd like yeah i know [Laughter] so for fy20 the update for the full board and again just that everyone is aware we did discuss all of these items um in fincum and this update is is just so that the full board is aware of everything that's going on for fy20 um the main update um for fy20 is that we are we in effect have a hundred and sixteen thousand dollars less of expenditures for fy20 two main reasons for that um we will we have received a reimbursement from um the coronavirus relief fund for forty one thousand eight eight five in addition to that there's seventy five thousand dollars um offering conferences that we're

098releasing so to speak or 75 75 000 different conferences that we will not be spending so overall 116 apart from that 116 000 a portion of that 26 120 will be added to our non-lapsing account um and this is not also a part of the um then go talk to your sister and tell her it's her turn to take it out before a good start hey melissa so sorry now can you come over to my house please and tell my kids to take it out before it gets dark so again real quick so 26 000 so off so this will give a full update office 116 we did we did request that a a larger portion be added to the non labs and account just to maintain a higher balance in our non-labs and account

099that will just overall help us to mitigate unforeseen expenses in future years the board of finance did not necessarily agree to that plan they did however agree that we can use twenty six thousand one twenty six thousand one twenty to mitigate fy twenty two um a budget item for f y fy22 um the difference up from this 116 will be will be returned to the town and this will be added to this to the town's unassigned fund balance okay that's update number one this is just friends that's i'm sorry just so the it's uh the 116 885 is the new number that will be the number what number is it tony what number is going to be returned to the town in terms of their unassigned fund balance ninety thousand seven sixty five uh nine

100zero six will will be returned to the talent um for their unassigned fund balance do i see that anywhere and not not specifically it's it's just not it's not laid out that way it's just by the map the 116 minus a 26 000. oh got it okay all right okay uh moving on to fy22 mitigating i'm sorry was there any question on fy20 no okay moving to fy22 mitigating plan so we met with fincom um a month or so ago just overall just to find creative ways uh to reduce um our 22 budget we're in a good place for this year fy21 and that we will have a surplus for this year based on the surplus that we will have for fy21 we set forth a plan to reduce our fy22 budget by roughly one

101percent or 542 thousand dollars 966. um the detail of all this is included in the packet unless someone wants me to go through the details of that but we can but the full detail is included in in the package yeah that that that basically doesn't change that that so that we end up with still the 1.68 increase versus uh the um this year's budget correct so again so the mitigating plan has three parts the first part of it two hundred and three thousand dollars two or three thousand six eighty eight will be paid from the none lapsing account as i mentioned previously or in our update prior the board of finance did repurpose the use of the non-labs and account the current use of the non-lapsing account was to fund um corporate related expenditure for

102foi 21. the board did the board of finance did agree that we can repurpose those funds and we can all we can use that money to pay uh contingent liability from fy 22 of 203 688 the second part of this is that we'll be using 235 980 roughly 236 from our current fy21 surplus to mitigate fy22 i'm sorry that i have to go through all these years um and the final piece of that was that we have savings for health insurance based on new rates that we have preliminary rate adjustment from the state and also savings um from the change in superintendent for approximately combined um health insurance and super inter intended salary savings of 103 298 and that's pretty much made up of the one percent reduction that will get us or that got

103us to the 1.68 budget increase now um is this the same i haven't looked is this the same schedule we have before or or based on or is this new information on health insurance no i don't know it's the same it's the same information um i think we gave this update i'm not quite sure we gave this update to the to fincom i think a few weeks ago okay nothing's changed no pretty much nothing is staying nothing has changed yeah okay the other piece that wanted to talk about is as it relates to the capital budget the capital budget was reduced by 56 540 we will be we have we shifted three items from the capital budget and we will also be using fy21 surplus to fund a few items there was a larger item

104that we had for 200 000 which was to aid um in the medi to mitigate the cost for the air and the unit for the old gym the board of finance um did not take the reduction instead just because this is a grand then there's a few steps and that needs to happen and because of time in what we will do after we have applied once the grant is open we've applied for it and we've received payment we will add that time and reimburse the town for for the 200 000 and that is the update for fy22 mitigating plan um phil uh any what are grants that are still outstanding to clarify tony when you say outstanding outstanding meaning that uh these are these are monies that we still are grants that are out there

105that we need to apply for but not really um they're they're not encumbered yet right sure so we have there is um esther ii we recently submitted our grant application for sr2 um so we're pending the review of that grant um the plan for that as we we've discussed before is that that will be used to to assist with learning loss um to address primarily math and read and catch up so to speak for fy22 there is a another grant which is american rescue plan um let's call that slash esser which is currently not open that grant is um roughly for 500 000 plus that is the initial estimate for that grant and that is the grant that we plan to draw two hundred thousand dollars from esther three are art esser this is a

106two-year grant the plan for this grant is also to assist with learning loss so this will fund the year two um of the plan that that that we have to address learning loss so this is pretty much sr2 will address year one and esther three i'm sorry sr3 arp esser will address year two of the learning loss of the plan for learning loss now will this be you know is your assessment that once we get these grants there are already programs in place that these plans could offset those expenses in our budget so that we would end up with a ultimately a surplus or no that or these or once you get the grant you need to actually create the you know this will you know once you get the grant there'll be expenses that

107will arise from the programs like which is it so these are costs that will arise from the program so there's there's a larger plan um that was developed by curriculum and instruction that really addressed the learning laws so there's so this is several apart so this is in addition to our budget so this will not result in a net savings okay any additional questions on this all right shift into current fiscal year fy21 um in summary as of um march 23rd we're currently are projected to have a surplus of approximately three hundred and forty thousand four fifty six the details of which are outlined in the package just wanna make a quick note uh that this surplus assumes that we will not be drawing from the non-labson account um we'll be using them funds in

108a non-labs in account to deal with fy 22 um contingent liability so we pulled it out of the of the current year yeah yeah okay all right because as we said we will have a surplus for this year and um and that's pretty much the update for fy21 and all three years really i'm sorry that was kind of a sprint but um and i know there's a lot of years coverage so any questions or a clarification that is needed okay thank you okay internal services fund i'm sorry internal services fine we currently are trending favorable um we are projecting to end the year with slightly above at about 780 000 or so um i think it's it's safe to say that we will definitely end the year with at least 780. the original plan was

109that we would end the year with the surplus in the internal services account of 760 000 all right there's no questions can i have a motion move that the western board of education approved the eighth appointment it's just the ninth fiscal year yeah just tonight move that the western board of education approved the ninth fiscal year 21 financial update as presented by mr cross second second ruby thank you ruby all in favor hi taffy hi melissa hi ruby hi gina hi hillary hi victor hi tony all opposed okay motion passes um now we have some policy work to do um bill melissa who's gonna take this yeah i think melissa is gonna actually has been doing gonna step up on this one right melissa we can backfill as need be sure i'm happy too um

110we have for the policy coming up uh the child sexual abuse and assault policy and relatedly the reports of suspected abuse or neglect of children or sexual assault students by school employees so those are both attached um here i think these are second reads right bill are they first reads uh the new business items would be first there is a there is a second read under the old business yeah oh i see okay great we've um we've talked about this in our committee but uh the changes here um for the the reports of suspected abuse or neglect of children and sexual abuse are basically title changes and name changes tracy um has reviewed these policies we discussed it at the policy committee and the changes there reflect um just the the you know different district

111employees that are no longer with the district and and trying to consolidate our policy so that we have names of titles instead of individuals um when we get to policy uh the third one which is the non-discrimination policy that one is a little bit more substantive um in the sense that we're also doing the name and title change as we've been doing through all of our policies but we're also uh changing in our policy just to comport with federal guidelines and title vii in terms of protected classes how the federal government wants to classify protected classes just so we can be consistent and also uh we have had a recent connecticut state law that's come into play um that includes certain ethnic traits and hairstyles as a protected non-discrimination category so we wanted to make

112sure we're compliant with state law there so those are the types of changes for those policies i'm happy to discuss them if anyone has any questions you know um things that are you know where we'd have to adhere to either state law or changes in state law those i'm assuming those get reviewed by our outside yeah everything as well they're coming to us from our outside counsel okay other changes that they have we belong to us uh i guess it's like a subscription service where you go through and and update us when there's changes like that that occur sure across for all their clients which were one of so um so that's really helpful for us yeah and consistent does anybody have any questions on the first reads of the three policies okay it will

113be coming back to us um we have second read on one yes um now this one we discussed a little bit at our last board meeting if i remember correctly this was um relating to the evaluation termination and non-renewal of athletic coaches um and this was just uh confirming that the superintendent has the ultimate authority with respect to um evaluating terminating and non-renewal of these um positions uh we also ran the policy by mark berkowitz athletic director and he agreed with with what the policy says and felt that that was the appropriate way to to handle uh these positions so we feel confident that that this is a a good policy for weston uh but if anybody has any questions i'm happy to answer them it's also attached here um to cabe and as part

114of the public record if anyone wants to look at it okay if there's no questions can i have a motion move that the western board of education approve policy administrative regulation 4116 evaluation termination and non-renewal of athletic coaches have a second back in all in favor hi ruby hi taffy hi melissa hi gina hi hillary hi victor hi tony all opposed okay motion passes um superintendent's report bill anything to uh to report um yeah there's one item here that's fair to address here which dan devito is going to step up on but let me do two sentences on it cabe is our our foundation our digital foundation for us running meetings getting information we now know we have to change that which dan will explain we think this transition will be pretty seamless as dan

115will explain and it doesn't need to be a postage agenda let me just give you an update so we're just keeping that here within the superintendent's report so dan why don't you go ahead sure so cabe is changing their meeting software as of july 1st we have no choice but to move forward with it uh meredith before she left it speak to the representative at cave about it the software is modernized it is a better product than what they currently offer us so there's going to be a transition period where we're going to be migrating everything over all of our meeting notes all of that stuff will be carrying over to the new site and we will be uh once we migrate over which again will be after july one we will provide training for

116everybody who's used to the old site in order to get comfortable with the new site i have spoken to other districts who have already made the transition and they basically said they're like it just took us a few minutes to get applicate um acclimated to the new site and and where everything is but it's it's relatively straightforward so if we know how to use the pre the current meeting software it won't be too difficult to transition to the new software so it still is the best and the least expensive uh board of ed or you know meeting software that that there is in the market that's really tailored towards boards of eds it was actually created by the kentucky board of ed and then kind of took on a life of its own um so

117i will keep everybody posted uh during the transition phase great thanks stan no problem just if there's no quest are there questions that's one other item if there's no questions okay so uh next week is teacher appreciation week if i'm looking at the calendar correctly uh we're gonna and i did send a note to the board just updating you on some things we're doing some of those are meant to be surprises we are going to frame it as staff appreciation uh we think the teachers will be fine with that because particularly this year it's been everybody trying to row in unison and rowing in unison in so many ways so we have from the central office a number of things we're working on to have go out i inherited the big cookie gift where platter's

118a big chocolate chip cookies i think i don't know if colleen started or predates colleen but we kept we've kept that going but i was told with a bad pun that would be just crummy only to give a big cookie so we are going to do a big sorry dan veto we are going to do the big cookie and some other surprises uh to try and be supportive of all the staff we know the pto steps up steps up wonderfully during this week and so we we're excited that in some nice ways we'll be able to release from the central office central administration thank all staff um i don't want to uh ruin your cover as a board uh in the past i know you've have done some things please feel free to do so

119just if you want to be in sync with us we are framing it as staff appreciation sure so it's everyone feels fully embraced for on what's been as you know better than all of us a very very interesting year to put it one way absolutely and that's the superintendent's report okay um anything from the committee chairs no um so our next meeting uh the may meeting which is uh may 17th uh we will probably have an executive session built right before that right uh so five o'clock um that i think is is it for the agenda for this evening unless there's uh anything anyone else wants to discuss um so yes we'll take advantage of having a two-hour meeting and giving everyone back the the rest of their evening there's still a little daylight out

120there um so with that um have a motion to adjourn so moved okay second second okay meeting adjourned thanks everyone