BOE Meeting 1/7/21 - Formal Presentation of Requested Budget

001thank you for your patience we now put your seat back and treay in the [Laughter] upright I think we're live now aren't we and we are live everybody oh great U okay I'd like to uh call this meeting to order Board of Education meeting uh it's a kickoff of of the budget season uh tonight is dedicated to uh presentation by the superintendent and the leadership team um on the 2021-22 budget um typically we start off our monthly meetings with the pl Pledge of Allegiance uh this isn't our regular monthly meeting but you know in light of uh some of the events that we witnessed in our nation's capital yesterday maybe it might be fitting uh to start this meeting off uh with the uh with the Pledge of Allegiance okay pledge allegiance to the flag

002of 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 I guess we'll um we'll I'll hand it over to uh uh to Bill uh and the leadership team to uh to go through the presentation I think after the presentation we'll do some housekeeping go through the timeline um and also discuss um the workshops that that are coming up during the month of January and then uh perhaps start um questions from the board we have a hard stop at 10 this evening uh I guess we'll plan on going to 10 because I'm sure that there's going to be lots of questions to start off and then we um will gather again at 9:00 am go from 9: to

0031 tomorrow with our first Workshop um so Bill let me uh hand it over to you to um start with the presentation sure uh thank you Tony thank you board thank you leadership team let me note the agenda does post for public comment at the end right before you adjourn uh so we'll have to keep an eye on that we are using the usual Google form uh I think that is now open just so question comments excuse me can be submitted by the public during this and those would be read at the end of our meeting this evening keeping track very much of the timeline that that Tony mentioned so let me do a screen share here um the I just want to make sure that you all are seeing the correct are you all

004seeing the title page Western Public Schools yes are you only seeing that page as opposed to other things around okay I've been well trained today and they made me practice several times just so you know um so uh this is now posted uh this PowerPoint um a PDF of it has now been put up on arcade meeting site so that all those uh listening in in the future can access it I did send it about a half an hour ago to the board so they'd have it early uh as I said in that email to the board it is quite a substantial presentation uh it's a presentation that's going to be really coming from multiple voices multiple perspectives very little for me um um I've helped frame it I've helped put it together but quite

005importantly you'll be hearing from cabinet Plus in the principles uh the entire leadership team uh had a dry run of this yesterday uh We've updated it fixed it corrected it some and as the board knows even 20 minutes ago we made a few Corrections um after tonight we may have to make a few more Corrections if uh we need to do that we'll just post an updated one um so my first job is simply to introduce what's here in this budget uh the bottom line in this budget is really the growth percent of 3.81 again let me repeat that 3.81 the leadership team is pleased to bring you uh a budget that's quite efficient we think very very effective towards advancing maintaining and advancing the Excellence the rigor the equity The Compassion that have been

006the signatures of Western schools for so long we know that that 381 is right in the neighborhood of where most of our area districts will be in terms of growth percent they bring to their boards and certainly over the next month we can talk more with you about that but we think we think this is a a good number a very healthy number and actually a much better number than we brought you last year at this point tonight's presentation I said is substantial and it's going to be really focused on bringing to life that bottom line the presentation after I'm done which will be very soon uh Phil will do a high level look at the budget allocation this is a budget so we need to make sure we're clear about numbers for you then

007we're going to shift to the narratives uh and on behalf of the leadership team Ken is put together the themes that come out of this budget what we would title striving for continued Excellence they'll run you as a board in the community through those themes then we'll go school by school starting uh at the earliest point on School Road if you come in off of Western AB Hut going all the way up through the high school with highlights then Tracy Edwards will pick up highlights with related to PPS and and sped quite importantly because it's a major investment area as we're recommending Dan Deo will pick up digital learning and instruction I'm sorry that's supposed to be there's an error digital learning and um and Technology uh and then we'll go back to Phil for

008a lot of detail on the budget what's driving this and then also where reductions are the administration identified a series of reductions that come up with the 3.81 figure uh we'll talk a bit about capital and then lastly Phil will spend some time uh reviewing uh what is a new budget book I know the board's been studying the book the last day or so it's a new look uh we credit Phil for this new look we like it as an Administration uh we think it's going to lead to a lot of good decision making and then cracking of those decisions over the coming year so let me just say a few more things here before I hand off the Baton uh today uh we did post of the outcome and the goals for this current

009year uh it given covid-19 and the demands of running the district uh they were a little bit delayed but they are posted they're up on our website the board has seen those the board has discussed us with those discuss those with us uh the leadership team feels very good about those goals uh and you go to the website you'll see this colorful image each of these parts of this image are interactive you drill in and you will see uh steps pertaining to this year uh but they tie to past year but also tie to the Future years and when we get into the part the themes that Ken is speaking to some of those goals will come to life but we built this budget this recommended budget very much with a strategic sense and paying

010attention to what is in now the posted set of goals and objectives covid-19 uh we debated whether or not to put this slide up up front but given the covid-19 is is dominating our life as Educators and and in many ways dominating the teaching and learning for our students and families we felt it's important to make a front-end statement here yes it's dominated and there have been concerns about growth and progress uh we we feel confident that our students are growing our students are progressing and in an unnamed way I'm going to cite a superintendent from way away from here over the last couple weeks has been saying to that superintendent's community yes worry about academic growth yes worry about social emotional but in a sense our students right now are learning so many things

011that are going to help them in the long term they're learning about perseverance and grit and determination flexibility and all of us as adults know that you got to have all of that to succeed so I would ask us and and we as a leadership team are thinking this way that yes the academics matter and we push on that yes the seal matters and we push on that but I think in this last half year and as we think about this budget for next year let's think about all the ways that uh as Educators we're growing but most importantly as young people were growing and and what are the positives we can take from this great challenge called covid-19 uh we we also think that this presentation is going to demonstrate that while dominated by

012covid-19 uh your team here has not stopped around Innovation we've not stopped around creativity we've not stopped to come up with really new ways to get the work done and we think given the 3.81 figure to do it in a very very efficient way in a way very sensitive to the concerns of Weston residents that we are as efficient financially as possible in the school district let me touch on enrollment quickly uh we always at this point do remind uh the community and the board of enrollment uh the status Malone MC broom is our partner the last three years in doing the enrollment analysis analysis for us uh they have been very very precise within about a 0. five differential on any of their projections for us uh this chart which we've used not last

013year but the preceding year with you uh shows where we are as of the October 1 submitted enrollment data that's when all districts in the state are required to submit their annual enrollment and you can see uh the change represented here from that for fy21 to what's project projected for fy22 we also a couple years ago not last year but we're bringing it back this year are showing you the fiveyear trend is projected by monea McBroom quite importantly they're projecting that out over the next five years there'll be a decline of 1.5% 1.5% nobody wants to be declining enrollment but that is a relatively low decline rate and very much matches many of of the districts in Connecticut other than our Metropolitan districts our urban districts most are in this SL decline you can see

014the largest drops are at the middle school and the high school projected whereas you're seeing increases at our two elementary schools herbut and whs rightly so the board had been asking that as of the start of this budget process we give you very fresh data so this is too small necess to read but uh this is a chart the board is very familiar with it's in the public record for so a lot of the public has seen it but this is as of today what is our enrollment we're at 2235 as of today to the far right I tucked in the school by school comparison so hbits at 388 Wiis at 494 the middle school at 557 high school at 796 uh the total differential from projected the from excuse me the October date uh

015data to this is is is small but it's all here for you to look at and understand it's grade byg grade we can certainly come back to this more over the next several weeks volunteer distance learning uh we are now pairing the reporting out of that information with enrollment um you can see here as I shared with the board a little not too long ago this evening uh that we've had quite a jump in our volunteer distance learning population we're now up as of today to 20% 20% of our enrollment is in volunteer distance learning uh and you uh you you can see where you've had increases and all the rest as we've said for a long time this is a required program by the state but we embrace it it's a way for families

016to have Choice during the covid-19 pandemic as to what how do they feel best about accessing their teaching and learning a survey went out to all the results of the survey went out to all families and staff earlier this week uh that was gathered run and analyzed by two members of the task force who put that work together and it's a very very positive set of results at the same time in each school and districtwide we're looking at those results to say how can we even make the voluntary distance learning program stronger uh you can be assured that these numbers do not contain students who are in quarantine we're very careful to try and to separate that out so this this is these are families that some of it may be short-term but are saying

017our choice for teaching and learning right now is in this remote mode let me now turn to Phil uh Phil will carry us through the allocation discussions and then he'll hand it off to Ken and we'll go from there so Phil uh good evening everyone can everyone hear me okay okay good um as you guys can imagine there's been quite a few iteration of this budget book and the various pages that we have so this when to firstly start by just thanking Andrew G for all his hard work and getting the final book ready and out to um to everyone so as Bill mentioned the full leadership work very closely to arrive at our current requested budget um B new slide so for fiscal year 2022 we will be requesting a 3.81% increase or 2

018million 61,2 n for a total request of 56 million 222,50 um as in as has been the case in past years you'll definitely notice that the significant portion of the budget of the budget allocation 78% really is for salaries and benefits of the remaining others other categories other services will account for the next significant allocation percentage or 11% so you'll see here um just just a step through the various lines salaries and benef salaries for fy22 will be 35,5 181221 um are roughly are roughly 60% of the requested budget um the year-over-year increase just for that line is 500 500,000 or 1.52% employee benefits request for fy22 will be 10,000 10 million 575,000 $226 approximately $119,000 this represent an increase of $98,000 or a 99.4% year-over-year increase Professional Services professional and Technical Services request for

019New Year 1,593 358 a roughly 2.83% um off our new request a year-over-year increase of $75,900 5% year-over-year Property Services 2,225 468 approximately 4% um of the budget budget request year-over-year increase of 4.04% or $86,000 of the services this is the next major category um that we that we will be looking at today you the request for fy22 will be 6,470 $168 approximately 11.5% this is a 533 roughly $534,000 increase um for this line are roughly 9% supplies and materials um will be will will be reduced this it's a request for fy22 of 2,600,000 48% reduction equipment the new request for equipment for fy22 will be 358,000 at 78 708 63% of our budget this represent a 133,000 almost 134% increase over a previous year budget or 61% Audra objects 12225 representing 0.2% of our

020budget which is which is a reduction of 2000 I'm sorry an increase of 2781 or 2.33 year a year so before um so before we have budget offsets the request is 57 milon 525 326 roughly a 2,231 500 or 4 4.04% increase we will have as in previous years reduction various direct Revenue reduction of 1 .3 million a 2.2% reduction of our budget or a $170,000 increase year-over year so again their increase for fy22 is 3.81% or 2,6 61209 total increase of 56 million I'm sorry total requested of 56 mil 22265 uh next page so the budget allocation expressed graphically as you can see that salaries and benefits definitely account for the vast majority of our budget um which is followed very very closely by other services next slide so just want to focus real

021quick just on the year-over-year increase um themselves so as you look at the various categories here um in terms of the adopted budget again salaries and benefits account for the vast majority of this followed by other services I just want to point out as it relates to when you do look at the budget in terms of what each category represent in terms of its percentage of the increase uh benefits is accounted for the highest percentage um as a as a percentage of the increase we will definitely speak a little bit more about this as the night progresses uh next slide pleas and this graphically here just a just a representation of just the increase by themselves and their various percentage um expressed graphically um next slide oh at this time um that's concludes just a

022brief overview of the allocation and I turn it over to Ken thanks Phil I appreciate that good evening everyone and uh let's pick up with the themes for this budget and for fy22 uh this budget really represents opportunity for us to build on the current work W not to move forward in three particular areas and these areas really bubbled up uh from the school and from a district standpoint uh align closely with the school so uh from a foundational standpoint we know that healthy learning is critical for our staff and our students everything builds off of that healthy learning environment uh so we have some very specific uh goals tied to this budget related to healthy learning uh teaching and learning certainly uh in a transitional year following uh this covid year we are going

023to be looking to uh to build uh and improve on uh certain areas of the curriculum and instruction and then certainly uh as you've seen this year you know we've uh for for several years have quietly worked in the Dei realm this year we've been more explicit about it but we're really going to lean into that work next year so those are our three major themes and let's go a little bit into detail into those the next well before I do uh this next slide if we think about the past budget and and budgets before that we're getting some very strong outcomes um that the Weston Community uh certainly should feel proud of and I just wanted to highlight some here I'll only speak to a few just to um to highlight the fact that

024uh with the resources that we are provided we are we try to be very efficient with those resources we receed some very high accolades national rankings um we we are very proud of the fact that we have a dedicated and highly trained expert facult we provide students with a a rigorous uh wonderfully demanding uh curriculum uh but we support them uh along the way and we see at the very end of this process with students how they do very well in achieving their uh their goals and getting into college um 33% accepted to our most competitive colleges I'll leave the rest for you to to look at but I just thought we should just take a step back first and take a look at um uh what Weston has accomplished with the support we have

025from the community next slide bill so uh picking up on our first theme of teaching and learning certainly this budget uh maintains our commitment to uh the class-size guidelines and personalizing The Learning Experience uh we are um you know next year with with math and literacy uh providing some support by way of uh resources and professional development to improve in those areas we have some new uh math electronic resources that are due to be renewed particularly at the whis in the middle school and then we uh we paused our partnership with Teachers College which uh has been a wonderful partnership to provide uh support to our teachers with our comprehensive literacy program uh we're proposing to resume that um with our professional development program and as you know uh in science we had a recent

026renewal of that curriculum uh and the most recent actually the first test scores um related to that showed that our efforts uh landed us with some of the top scores in the state and uh you we've continued with science during this covid year we're going to continue to build on that strong Foundation next slide Bill uh certainly uh from the standpoint of supporting all of the students um in our school system we're going to continue uh with with Tracy uh going into more detail later how we are supporting students with special needs uh with the supports they need as well as bolstering our intervention services last year we put some resources into that in terms of Staffing uh and now in terms of professional development we will continue that next year the budget also maintains

027our commitment to our project ChalleNGe Program which is very uh important for for uh a certain profile of student that we want to ensure that they have those uh resources available and now for our staff uh because technology is so critical with the Aging Fleet of laptops you're going to hear from Dan DeVito how a big driver in this budget is uh the replacement of laptops so teachers have the right Tools in their hands uh and obviously one of the Main Stays of our instructional program are our curriculum leaders and coaches who are teaching in the classroom but also a very supportive uh coach uh and trusted colleague who provides professional learning and curriculum support next slide and finally for teaching and learning I I think it shouldn't go on notice that you know in

028Weston we truly have a comprehensive program and this budget supports all the things we have built in the past several years a great uh stem program with a lot of different offerings that are very current um continue to support a performing arts program uh The Writing Center at the high school has really become an essential resource and let's not forget that uh within those libraries we have these design spaces these maker spaces that are accessed and used as part of the curriculum next so with um the another goal uh that we have uh to maintain and build on the Excellence for for healthy learning environments we have a very creative program uh that the high school has developed under uh Lisa diorio excuse me Lisa wak excuse me uh alternative Pathways and this is designed

029to improve the quality of services for students um who have social emotional needs and you'll be hearing more about that and that actually not only an improved program there are some uh slight cost savings there as well uh in terms of social emotional learning and emotional intelligence we've had uh several years of focusing on this work but we will have continued training uh and support in that area next next slide and then finally uh the third area our diversity Equity inclusion work uh we do have funds for Consulting and uh support in in that area uh curriculum development work the board has heard in curriculum meetings how uh we are particularly in in Humanities uh are making some curricular adjustments and changes to have a more inclusive curriculum as evidence to that we have two

030new courses that have been approved by the the board uh the American tapestry course and the voices from The Edge at the high school and uh let's not forget our uh commitment to our open Choice program that this budget supports uh by encouraging uh Bridgeport students the opportunity to attend uh School in Weston uh and then uh alongside our budget which is for consideration it's not currently in the the budget book itself is the teacher Residency program that we explained at the last uh board meeting uh this does provide an opportunity to expand the diversity of personnel um by uh bringing in uh diverse uh candidates to begin their uh teaching careers here uh supported by a mentor and that is something I'm sure will be up for for discussion as part of this budget

031process so uh with that I think now the schools can give you a little bit more of the flavor of uh how we're going to bring that to life uh and and leverage the budget and we'll begin at hbut with Laura cadis thank you Ken students begin their Journey Through the Weston public schools at hurlbut we are focused on providing a safe and engaging learning environment where our youngest Learners can grow and develop while acquiring the skills and habits that will set them up for Success Through the coming years next slide please the HUD budget supports an overall increase in enrollment of 29 students even with this increase this budget reflects a maintenance budget with several cost savings our materials and books help us maintain and replenish our needed classroom materials it also includes enhancing

032our Resources with books that support diversity equity and inclusion we will continue to defer the return of the K2 World language program which will reflect a cost savings as well as deferring the return of the computer teacher which was a 0.5 FTE resulting in another cost savings I will also be deferring a request for a slight increase in our supervision for lunch and recess even with the um increase in enrollment and at this point I will now turn um over over to Patty falber for whis thank you Laura and um and thank you um for uh giving me the opportunity to speak to our tonight about our proposed budget um at Weston Intermediate School um we take pride in fostering a caring and responsive um community of Learners that encourages an appreciation of individual differences

033and each students developing abilities um we strive to build the essence of community each day and every classroom and create learning experiences that challenge each student to pursue um excellence in all aspects of their life and we believe that the budget that we are proposing will help us to fulfill this Mission um next slide so our um enrollment uh for next year is projected to be 486 students an overall decrease of seven students from this year however um that enrollment is not even across all grade levels um next year we're projected to have um some increases in grades three and five um five students in grades three and nine in grade five and a um significant decrease of 21 students in grade four um so therefore in order to adhere to uh our district class

034size guidelines we are proposing a reduction of one class size in grades four but we will still keep the class sizes um with that reduction around 22 students um a major Initiative for um the intermediate school for next year will be the imple implementation of the um curriculum renewal process in math uh for grades three and four um this was begun this year um in grades five the majority of these costs though can be found in the curriculum and instructional Improvement section of the District budget um we are proposing to maintain um our instructional materials and Supply budget lines um as well as our book budgets um which will help us um enhance um and continue to grow our resources to support diversity inclusion and equity and lastly we are proposing um cost savings by

035continuing to defer the additional 0.1 increase um for math intervention um and we are confident that we can meet the needs of our students with our proposed Staffing model and now at this point I'll turn it over to Dan do for the middle school thank you very much Patty uh it's always a privilege to uh speak on behalf of the middle school and I would like to thank uh the cils the curriculum instructional leaders um who uh helped develop this budget for the various departments as well as uh Drew Walters the assistant principal and uh Nancy darling my assistant for her support uh the the mission of West of Weston middle school and I think it's it Bears repeating every time I get an opportunity uh to talk about the Middle School uh it's a

036unique age group and we are helping students transition from Elementary School prep and preparing them uh for the much greater Independence they need to be successful in high school so the teaming model where we group students uh into teams where they have the same set of interdisciplinary teachers is key to that success those teachers meet regularly to not only planned curriculum uh but also talk about their observations about students uh their academic needs their social emotional needs and uh any behavioral concerns so I I really um am very grateful to the dedicated staff that we have at Western Middle School who take the role of middle school so seriously next slide please uh so the big story in the development of this budget it is um as you know already a maintenance budget for the

037most part uh we are noticing for the first time now that um the enrollment is is is really significantly impacting the Middle School um we're used to having class sizes in the 190s uh last year when we saw this cohort coming in with 172 we had to make a change uh and go from typically our nine section grade level down to eight sections that cohort is now moving into seventh grade and um so we're seeing now two grade levels that will be uh staffed for uh in the budget for eight sections rather than nine so there will be significant FTE savings uh based on that uh enrollment next slide please um so again the major driver for our budget really uh in terms of savings is is enrollment based um in seventh grade in addition

038we took a a hard look at our intervention services last year the board funded a math uh specialist for the first time at the middle school uh a full-time math specialist and as we look at how we're addressing the needs of our students uh who do have struggles and difficulties in math um speaking with the curriculum instructional leader for math uh we feel confident that we can meet those students needs for those tiered interventions for tier two and tier three through the services of the math intervention specialist uh and therefore we are um proposing the elimination of FTE that had been dedicated to the math half lab um program um and the final thing I guess that I would say for us is you know in our commitment to social emotional learning we um we

039really want to reinvigorate our wingman program we had to put that in abeyance this year because so much of what the wingman program uh encourages is not possible with the covid um health and safety restrictions uh but we do have funds in the budget to bring back some training to allow us to uh uh bring back the wingman program in postco times next slide please and without further Ado I will introduce my colleague Lisa wak principal of the high school good evening thank you very much Mr do I'd like to take the opportunity to thank assistant principes Julian gavone and Matt Phillip as well as our program councel at the high school which is comprised of our curriculum instructional lead and director of guidance for their collaboration in the creation of this high school budget

040and also um my assistant jod Setta who um is just a tremendous help in every possible way we see this as our Collective responsibility to present a request that supports our school mission in a fiscally responsible way our faculty is very proud of uh our students at Weston High School next slide please we really strive to empower our students to become Innovative thinkers creative problem solvers and inspired Learners that are ready to contribute and thrive in our Global society and a couple of the highlights that Dr craw referenced is that 95% of the class of 2020 matriculated to a 4year college more importantly 99% of the class of 2014 graduated College within six years that is not the norm we are very proud of that and we also recognize that it is a K12 Collective

041effort um that we are able to achieve this in an exemplary District our enrollment at the high school you can see is I believe it's uh 796 with a difference of nine students um I think that slide is a little bit off but the bottom line is is it's less than 10 which is minimal when you think that 73% of our classes are mixed grade levels we don't have like uh you know uh 10 second grade sections for example we have many courses that like 9th 10th 11th and 12th graders are in together so consequently our most important request is the Staffing which has been looked at very carefully and conservatively and we hope that you can support support it it is important to note that our certified Staffing request is actually a decrease from

042last year's budget request of a 1.4 but you know Staffing at the high school is so critical because our students and our graduates continuously tell us that the relationship between their teachers and them their counselors or them is what sets Weston High School really apart so I again I hope that you can support this uh request we have reallocated Staffing in a way that I believe um is um very effective and we are able to as Dr C said offer two new courses the American Tap stre and voices from The Edge without any additional Staffing those courses uh were created um in response to student feedback in both a climate survey as well as Focus groups in the spring that they wanted um more diverse perspectives to study more diverse uh perspectives and it aligns

043with our mission that we are trying to um prepare our students to contribute to a global Society uh we are also increasing our math lab support um which is huge um providing going from 50 to 84 uh spots to be able to help students over the course of our um quarter semester where students can get the kind of help like they do in The Writing Center again no additional FTE just a reallocation of FTE and then we also have our American our alternative Pathways excuse me uh proposal which I know that my colleague um Tracy Edwards is going to elaborate on I can just say that we are very excited about it it is an in-house program that was uh developed created amongst the uh curriculum instructional leaders our administrative team as well as our

044director of guidance and we think that it speaks to the our level of personalization and meeting uh students individual needs that um our district is known for so without further Ado I would like to turn it over to our director of Athletics at this time mark burwitz thank you Lisa I appreciate that and continuing along the line of positive statistics it's hard to to match what the high school accomplishes but I I'm really proud of what our athletes accomplish every year um it amazes me when I get to talk about it and have to compile some of these numbers it's just truly amazing what they're able to do every year our athletes and our coaches uh and if you look at this slide it shows over the last 10 years using full years only obviously

045last year we lost um well more than a third of our season um but using the last full 10 years we're averaging 70% of our student population participating in at least one sport over the last 10 years we're averaging 81% of our athletes earning academic recognition while they are participating in their season 82% of our teams are recognized by the conference or the state for sportsmanship um over the last 10 years we're averaging seven Southwest conference championships and five state championships and those numbers may seem small if you don't put them into perspective but there are teams in our conference who haven't won seven championships in the last 10 years and there are many schools in our state who haven't won five state championships over the last 10 years yet we're averaging five of them

046per year on top of you know the the off- the- field stuff that was mentioned first um also worth noting twice in the seven years that the award was given Weston High School is recognized as the most outstanding exemplary athletic department in the state of Connecticut I like to think that they stopped giving the award because they were sick of giving it to us um there's no proof to that but it's still fun to think that way so as we move on to the next slide you will see uh this year's budget or next year's budget request uh which is a a small increase of 1.73% over this past Year's um budget request um worth noting that the requested amount in the supplies line has increased only once in the last 16 years when the

047cost of those supplies and the cost of shipping those supplies increases every year uh also doing a little little back search um if you compare to 10 years ago we have 133% more athletes participating last school year than we did 10 years ago um so more athletes to outfit more equipment needed and yet that line the the one line that we truly have control over does stay as flat as we can keep it um what drives this our budget are which is similar to the overall budget is the annual uh contractual increases so our transportation line went up 6.5% officials 2.6% support help 2.5% and our coaches are up 1% um there are no new coaches or teams included in this budget however um I did want to mention that it is time to start

048talking about our tier 2 sport assistant varsity coaches we started in 2012 talking about our contact sport assistant varsity coaches the tier one sports um and it we according to that schedule we were hoping to get to the tier 2 Sports in 2018 and 19 so we're a little behind um and due to sports skill specialization and obvious safety concerns that go along with the number of athletes and the sports specializations um we do feel that it is time to turn our attention to those assistant varsity coaches and also wanted to mention Esports which has uh fulfilled its three years as a club um self-funding and is growing every year um so that's something else that will need to be discussed at least um looking at their coaching expenses for that sport I thank you

049and obviously here to answer any questions that come up later on um and we'll turn the program back over to Ken CW excuse me it's a tough act to follow but if anyone could follow that it's our performing arts program and um not to be outdone uh we have tremendous accolades uh within um the Performing Arts uh band Orchestra and chorus I mean this is a big one 38% of our students participate in those uh ensemble at the high school and if you look at some of the honors uh listed here our students are doing that at high levels and that's a testament not only to them and their hard work but to their teachers as well um and so um on the next slide please I also want to highlight the uh Theater Arts

050uh within our performing arts program um as you know this is also critically important we uh we have several co-curricular um Productions uh at the whs middle school and the high school supported by uh we have several stipended positions uh supporting those shows as well as we have a theater coordinator uh that coordinates all aspects of our program uh we maintain all of those uh supports in the budget from a staffing standpoint and we do have some slight uh inre increases in some of the accounts that support our theater arts program because this uh was a cost center that was broken out uh last year uh specifically in its own Center I just wanted to highlight this that um you know we continue to fully fund our theater arts program and uh have uh you

051know any increases related to that most of that's due to um the Staffing um related to it so with that um I think that then takes us to the next slide and we're going to talk about uh people Personnel Services Tracy sure thank you um I I do want to start with two sort of big ideas as I introduce the PPS and special education budget uh which is a different kind of budgeting than um the rest of the District budget for two primary reasons uh in my opinion one is complexity and I'll talk about what I mean by that and also the theme of confidentiality um what's unique particularly unique about the special education component of the budget is that we're really looking at individual student needs and as a result because the budget is

052largely driven by individual student needs and needs that can change over time there can be some variability there um and we have a moral ethical and legal obligation to meet those needs as they evolve or as they stay consistent over time the other um idea that I think is really important to just highlight is the concept of confidentiality we are a relatively small District um and because the budget is driven largely by individual student needs we just have to be respectful of the confidentiality of the students that we're talking about within this budget H next slide please I think throughout this presentation the theme of consistency has come up a few times um the goal with the PPS and sped budget this year overall is to deepen and solidify practices that have been established through

053uh prior Investments and expenditures and of course always keeping that goal of continuing to strengthen the programming that we provide for our students um primarily the proposed budget maintains sta in programs and services we're doing that to ensure that all of the procedural aspects of our programming uh maintain in place and that we continue to meet the needs of our students while the theme is definitely consistency you will see a lot of consistency within the proposed budget there are some changes I want to highlight uh within this slide um the first is that there are two primary proposed reductions that you'll see one is the reduction of a par educator position um and the other is we had allocated uh point2 of an SLP position that we actually have not needed to utilize this year

054um both of those are being eliminated in the proposed budget again the rationale for that elimination is the needs of the students that were servicing within those supports there are some increases um also proposed within the budget um one of the primary areas and we'll see it on a later slide that I think Phil is going to step us through is related to students placed out of District uh we do have students whose needs are complex and require programming that's more intensive that we than what we can provide within the Weston public schools and there's changes in variability based on changes in student need over time uh we are also working through the impact of covid with which I'll talk a little bit about on the next slide um and then another update that I

055just wanted all of you to be aware of is that effective July uh we are now required to provide services to students who qualify um until they turn 22 until their 22nd birthday um previously it was we provided Services uh through the end of the school year where they turned 21 uh this is a significant change and and basically from a budget standpoint it requires an additional year of Eligibility than we've had in any previous budget year next slide please the impact of co9 um I think Bill spoke to that earlier in the presentation it has definitely posed a series of unique challenges within PPS and sped um I think the most obvious is that right now we're implementing individual student plans in the context of various schooling scenarios and schedules um we are absolutely

056working in collaboration with families as we develop those plans and provide supports and services to students um but even with that work there are challenges that might have legal and fiscal implications for the district moving forward um I will note that we are recommending a reduction in the special education contingency but we are doing that cautiously uh given the evolution that's occurring from a legal standpoint not just in Weston not just in Connecticut but in districts around the country uh next slide from a programming standpoint both Ken and Lisa alluded to this program earlier we are proposing a shift from ESS which is a a program that's supported by staff outside of our district to an internal program that we're calling alternative Pathways um the overall aim of the program will still be to support

057students with complex social emotional and behavioral needs within the district um but as Lisa shared earlier we are excited by the fact that many uh Weston High School staff members administrators instructional leaders um our counseling department have taken the lead in developing a program that further embeds these supports and services within our high school and also capitalizes on the talents of our own staff I think the key feature of this program is that the team has really looked at expanding academic learning opportunities for these students um and we are able to do it at a budget savings to the district this will require the addition of two um new positions one a certified position one a non-certified position but the net of that is still a reduction and next slide we have taken a conservative

058approach to the budget this year and I think we're all mindful of the reasons that we need to do that um but I think we should always be looking ahead and uh one of the areas that we are focusing on quite a bit this year and will need to be a continued Focus moving forward is transition um we have a talented transition coordinator right now it is a split position part transition coordinator part teaching role um and the role of transition coordinator is a complex job uh it's an area that we very much want to be able to expand in the future and be looking at transition Beyond just the high school but also at the middle school level as well the overall goal there um is to find ways to strengthen the process for

059transitioning our students from high school to Life Beyond High School in whatever form that takes with that I'll turn it over to Dan who's going to step through digital learning and Technology all right good evening everybody uh we know that especially during this year uh digital learning and technology has really come to the Forefront next slide uh the 2021 year uh is leaving us with with two Salient points in terms of digital learning and Technology the first is the Paradigm Shift of the role of technology in the classroom that will persist beyond the pandemic it's no longer a support tool to be used by Educators it's now fully intertwined in all fets of education however we can't make purchases just for the sake of Technology use we must ensure that all digital learning and Technology

060initiatives are fully aligned with curriculum and instruction and provide an immersive experience for students the second point is what happens if we wait too long to replace aging technology when technology is unreliable staff and students lose trust in the equipment we've provided them so to counter this we put together a comprehensive six-year technology road map that will ensure we don't run into this problem in the future for next year the major purchase is the replacement of Staff laptops we've heard about this before the current set laptops are 7 to 10 years old and they need to be replaced as soon as possible and they all need to be replaced one of the positives that came out of this year was The increased use of software and websites by reducing infrastructure costs as well as management

061licensing costs we're able to keep software that we purchased this year in direct response to the pandemic while keeping the software budget flat next slide please this is the six-year technology replacement plan it clearly Maps out what needs to be replaced when and it maximizes the life of equipment while ensuring we do not go beyond the end of usable life this plan includes both staff and student Hardware as well as backend infrastructure to Future proof the district for what's to come in terms of Technology next slide now I'm going to pass it on for Budget drivers and reductions do soon I can't believe I'm back up again all right so is so earlier um in our discussion we spoke broadly about the categories and just overall makeup um we're just going to try to add

062on a few layers um onto that onto that bone so to speak um just to give an overall sense as to really where we are and how we really got to to to to the current budget um next slide please so again so the main service that we have has is is really on our under our salaries a few things here the adopted budget um budget salaries really is primarily focused on the contractual increases for um for all level of Staffing um as you you heard earlier there has been a few reduction in Ft both at the lower at at the middle school and the high school there also some changes in salaries that had to do with staff turnover for next year grade one will have a section increase um and grade four will

063have a section reduction you will recall um heading into um just after the adoption of the the approval of the budget um the board did vote to reinstate the it manager position for this year and that was supposed to be a budget neutral position um that position is a needed position um and Dan can speak some more about that and that will be an increase to our current Year's budget in addition to that last year we also did eliminate the PPS director um admin admin assistant after we a few months of Tracer being here and everything else we did determine that there was a need to reinstate that position that will also be an increase to our budget of um roughly $61,000 um you'll also recall that we did add in over the summer an

064increase to a grade one section um we also did increase the grade three section however that section was paid from the open Choice grant for fy22 we after close after reviewing the data um we do believe that we can increase our um the allowance that we have for turnover savings so we will be increasing our turnover savings by $63,000 another was really a reduction um you'll recall last year when the budget was approved um we did have some unsettled contract at that time and we did budget um approximately $180,000 to account for all of those um um s increases last month um we did um approve the board approved transfers to the various categories the various object codes to pretty much chew up um those various object codes so we would have a better uh

065year-over-year comparison so as as we look at salary collectively we're looking at an increase of 500,000 or roughly a three a 93% of our budget next slide please Heth employee benefits see I'm not quite sure if you recall but I I highlighted that in terms of the increase um when you look at the categories and as a percentage of the increase um employee benefits is accounting for roughly 44% of that increase just want to to point out let me just step to this real quick health insurance you will recall I'm sorry that I'm using that terb techology quite a bit but um just want to refresh everyone's memory we are on the state partnership plan those rates the rate increase for the state partnership plan it is is set by the state of Connecticut typically

066we do not see any um or we do not get any indication of to what that rate increase will be until early spring for our purposes this year we have assume assumed an 8% increase for um for health insurance which include that Regional rate adjustment the major shift that we have for this year is um as it relates to dental claim so for fiscal year fy21 the operating budget did not make a contribution to an internal Services fund the internal Services fund is where our all of our health dental claims are paid from instead for fy21 we drew on the reserve of the internal Services fund to the tune of $397,000 for fy22 the operating budget will fund the internal Services fund for dental claims and related fees to the tuna $421,000 680 this will

067in this will increase our budget by 78 not a significant reduction that we have in um in the employee benefit has to do with with our EP for all intents and purposes this is the final year there is one final payment that is due for EP which will be paid out in FY 23 but for fy22 we we will be seeing a reduction in our early retirement incentive program of $48,000 we did report earlier this year that through the negotiation um with ins uh Insurance committee that we were able to receive a lower than expect Ed premium increase for workers compensation this is also reflected um in our budget we we will be reducing that line item so employee benefits will account for 1.68% of our budget roughly 98266 next slide please professional and Technical

068Services last year um during the deliberation Pro um the budget discussions we did reduce legal fees um just in in general um also was not reduced but we did we did budget for fy21 legal fees as it relates to sped below their below the trend for for the past several years that Trend we have realized that that trend is continuing for 21 and we do anticipate that there will that will also continue for fy22 because of that um we will be increasing um or we are proposing to increase the sped uh legal fees by $90,000 in addition to that we have also seen increased costs for um General legal counsel as for the entire district and based on that we are increasing legal legal fees for the district for 30,000 we are proposing an overall

069increase in legal fees of uh $130,000 in our current fy21 budget um we did include there was an assumption that novas which is our consulting services for it um would be directly built to the Board of Education as it was in the past with a reimbursement to the town that was indeed not the case novas is direct bill in the town so we will be reducing our Professional Services line um by $46,000 46 roughly $47,000 later on you will see a correspondent reduction in our Revenue offset to account for this overall we we have seen um reduction um in other Professional Services um for $7,000 Professional Services will account for 0.14% of our budget or $76,000 next SL please cleaning services um I'm sorry proper services in r&m um we do our contract our 0

070clean in is currently outsourced um and it has been outsourced to a third party for several years and I guess since forever um there's a contractual increase for that which which accounts for roughly $76,000 this is really a net we had some other items um that we had in our cleaning services and we did reduce those particular miscellaneous line items um just so just to point out then when we do look at our budget it is really from a zero budget based approach so we do look at every sing item outside of contractual obligations that we have to truly see to truly review the need for those services and make the necessary adjustments for that again in terms of contractual increases there will be a contractual increase for a septic management company of $3,900 in

071addition to that after reviewing the data and in terms of the repairs not repairs but the general level of service that is needed to maintain the Xenon plan we are increasing or we're proposing to increase the septic Management Services by $20,000 for fy20 um budget as it relates to our copier contracts we did double we took a double reduction um for copy for for reductions we took a reduction last year in our software account and we also took in Era a reduction in in The copier line as well um so this 18,000 here is just to True up or to truly bring that copy your lease in line pretty much in L in line to where it should be for this year there's some other reduction which we will talk about later for Property Services

072totaling $32,000 Property Services will account for 0.16% off our budget um increase or $86,000 next slide please not the other large category that accounts for the significant increase in our budget this year has to do with other services um as as uh Mark mentioned earlier there will be an increase in our transportation contract there's this is going to be year three of five um for a transportation contract the the contract for the remaining three years will be 6.5% um so Transportation cost here um will represent that increase it also covers increase for spread and in also included in that are slight increases for spread out of District transportation which is provided by a third-party provider a significant portion which Tracy mentioned has to do with the individual individualized nature of um sped um we are

073finding that for this year um as it relates to the budget that we will need to increase um the budget as it relates to tuition and settlements by 6 28,000 um just want to point out um real quick while we're here that the district does receive excess Co um does receive excess cost um funds for all claims or all let's say expenditures that are in excess of 4.5% of our net prior net per pupil expenditure of roughly pretty much anything above $15,000 um we have some um reduced allowances that we'll talk about further totaling $189,000 approximately other services will account for roughly 0.99% off our budget or 533,000 next SL please supplies and materials um the changes here are really minimal as it minimal as it relates to just overall supplies um material software the

074big reduction that we have here is the reduction in um or the end of life of our lighten contract lighten upgrade contract this contract was entered into I do believe an fy20 there is one payment that remains and that payment um will be in July of fy22 and we will be seeing a reduction here of $51,000 as I mentioned previously we do take a zero budget approach to budget and based on that review and based on the current rates um for for fuel and for propane we are proposing a reduction to their propane line by $1,000 in addition to that we've also reval our security and supplies um line item and we are or we will be reducing that line by 35,000 supplies and materials will be reduced by 0 2% equipment so as Dan

075mentioned Dan mentioned previously the major initiative this year will be the replacement of our district teach districtwide teacher laptop laptops the total cost for that is $37,000 from a year-over-year basis the net increase um in our supply account is roughly 133 $34,000 or 0.25% of our budget next slide um small increases into other object these are 8,000 lines roughly increase is really 0 one% next slide um as I mentioned earlier the the district will receive excess cost reimbursement total in $143,000 I just want to point out for this year um we did not we came in at the very top of the reimbursement level there has not been any significant increase in the excess cost excess cost grant for the past number of years um the average reimbursement rate is roughly uh 70% reimbursement rate

076and we are com coming in at the very top this tend to fluctuate based on the number of um Grant application or pretty much application that states receive for excess costs um in any given year um so I just wanted to point point out that we have to keep a very close eye on um on on this particular um Revenue offset we're proposing um are we we based in current trends we are anticipating an increase in our nonresident tuition of $9,600 um the open Choice Grant uh just want to just we wanted to have a general this this is included here because we wanted just to have a dis a discussion in terms of what expenditures will be applied against that open Choice Grant all grants are the grants are in a separate budget they're

077in our grants account but just for discussion purposes we have it here um just just just to have that discussion also mentioned earlier that because novas is being directly built to the town we will not be getting a reimbursement by the town and this is at $45,000 participation fee this is technically um pretty much a correction um of to where we were last year last year we budgeted um at the gross level and not at the net level there is for there is $20 Mark you can correct me if I'm wrong there's $20 um for each student for par distribtion fees is set aside for the turf field replacement and the track replacement I do believe Mark um this is the the net cost of that and this is the year- aye adjustment for that

078so we will see um a slight increase in our Revenue offset of minus 3 I'm sorry 31% or 170,000 so just to wrap this up we will be requesting an increase we'll see an increase in our requested budget of 3.81% of roughly $2 million 61206 next slide please so how do we get here we we did realize that we have we do realize that we have a fiscal responsibility to the town um and based on that we did review thoroughly all the requests that were made and there are a lot of new initiatives not new requests that were made and for this year because of the significant or the main focus being the investment in our teacher laptops and coming in with a budget that was really fiscally really fiscally responsible we made we made

079a few Cuts next slide please um most of these here you heard you you've heard before we will be reducing our pirate educator um districtwide um allocation not necessarily as it relates to sped but just in general for the district to to really see if we can reduce that line item by one FTE Tracy did mention previously about the speech the speech language pathology or um a reduction there of 0.9 and again just going back to that zerob based budget approach right so it's not taking our budget and just and just pretty much just reopen our budget based on what the CPI is we truly we truly do take a deep look at every single line atom that we have so we can come up with a budget that is truly fiscally responsible and also

080truly reflect what the needs of the districts are uh grade seven you heard about this from Dan do we there there is going to be based primarily on enrollment a reduction in the grade seven um section in addition to that as Dan mentioned there we will be eliminating the math lab support for Combined reduction of 1.6 we've taken a look at um our groundkeeper and for fy22 we are proposing a reduction of one groundkeeper Staffing at the high school Lisa did mention that the overall cut is going to be a 1.4 um I'm reflecting a 1.2 here um not because of Lisa but because we have accounted for the this the the theater the theater coordinat position to remain at the at the high school and the high school's budget we may need to do

081a little bit of housekeeping as it relates to that point too so this is why there's a discrepancy between that 1.4 that Leisa mentioned and the 1.2 that's shown here you also heard from Laura that we will be once again pausing for this year both the K2 computer um teacher and also the K2 word language overall we're looking um for for just pure salaries and benefits released 371 71,000 reduction or 69% um there were request for new stiens for this year totaling $23,000 Mark did mention that we do need to um in future years take a look at that tier two um coaching stiens that we have in addition to that um the Esports um as again we mentioned just wanted to focus on our main Initiative for this year which is our teacher laptops

082and based on that we want to should just not bring forth any other new initiatives um just to allow the district to adequately fund um those laptops so we will see um reduction there of 202 24,000 employee employee benefits this is reduction as it relates to um reduce census of $65,000 next slide please again just tying in everything as it relates to just taking it Taking A Zer budget approach to our bud budget um we took a we took a look at our rubbish removal in our fy21 budget we did have assumptions that um our rubbish rates would have increased in in the marketplace we did see at last year that many other municipalities were facing significant increases as it related to um their recycling um costs we did fraed that increase um we did

083not see a significant increase as it related to um recycling we did reach out early to our curent provider and they did agree that they will hold our rates flat for another year um and we do have that built into our current contract um that we have a few years when we can renew that or extend the current contract repairs and allowance based again once again just on from a zero budget perspective we are proposing to reduce repairs allowance the roofing contract the contracted Services the pavin and the snow plowing um reduction we're proposing a reduction to Property Services of a minus .1% or $47,000 uh next slide please other services uh Tracy did allude to that that the contigency AUD allowance that we have for sped has been reduced for this year historically this

084number over the past couple of years we have had an contingency or an allowance for just the unknown because as you know sped is that are is completely variable so we are for this for fy22 we will be reducing that from 3,000 to $150,000 I'm also mentioned previously was the transition from ESS to the alternative pathway the school-based alternative Pathways um in our previous meetings and and I may have misinterpreted that I think the board wanted to see the cost uh for that alternative Pathways as Pathways as a single line um it is expressed as a single line in in our budget this is object code 5605 um and that does show the full funding of the program um other services um as it relates to overall spread PPS will will be reduced by $190,000

085or Point minus 0.18% next slide um again just just focus onor R new Initiative for for next year which is a funding off the teacher laptops uh the schools did propose or did request um replacement for a few uh musical equipment and various other requests for just equipment in general um the administration took the the point of view that for this year um we were not going to bring bring forth those items also included in this number was an an improvement for the me and space up the Boe me and space um upgrade at the middle school that that would come in at a cost of $31,000 again just from a fiscally responsible perspective we decided not to bring forth that Initiative for this year um so we will be red we have we did

086reduce equipment line by $96,000 or roughly get negative .8% next slide other objects um again from a zero zero based perspective we reduce our other object by 2500 and as I mentioned previously um the open Choice Grant is listed here um in order for us to determine what expenditures we should be um or we should should be applied or allocated to excess cost Grant in all likelihood um we do think that um an increase one of those increased sections uh primarily at hurlbut will be applied to that Grant so overall um from the initial requested budget that we that came in at roughly 5.44% we did reduce that request by 1.62% or $878,000 to our current 3.81 requested budget um next slide Capital request all right next slide [Music] please so overall um this is

087just a quick overview we will get into more detailed detailed discussion as to what uh Capital uh requests will be you'll notice here that's quite that's what's missing from here our significant um Capital requests for the Middle School um and we will talk some more about that um and the main reason for that is just working with the feasibility committee are waiting on the facilit facility feasibility committee um for their recommendation which is forthcoming next slide I think Phil wanted me to just to underscore here uh the narrative around what's in the capital budget very important for the community and the board is that's a three-year uh presentation of the capital budget in the book uh the board has asked to review year one but it's been very helpful in the P both to you

088as a board as well as a board of Select and board of Finance in the town to see the three-year plan absent in that three-year plan though is anything for the middle school so we wanted to stress why that is and it does tie quite substantially the very very important work and we would hope very much pathbreaking work of the town of Western facility feasibility committee uh I think as the board knows through last month's update from from that group that there's they won't be done with their work until well until the next fiscal year uh all of us anticipate that there'll be major decisions would relate to the middle school that is an area of great great need and last year any of the capital items for the Middle School were put on hold

089by a number of the bodies so right now we've not built that into uh this Capital request very importantly though the items it would be in are listed in the notes section very clearly and by dollar for you as a board to consider and again uh this material is not new to you as a board it's been looked at over the last several months in the facility committees as well as very closely with the building committee who's actively involved with you on this and I guess I now get to say next slide right all right so by now I think uh the board and maybe some members of the community have gotten a chance to um to see that the budget book for this year um has a new look um so we just wanted

090just to just to take some time just to go over just a quick overview off that new budget and um and just talk about it next slide please so I know many many of you may be asking why did we change the budget book so as we started this year when we started FY 2021 you know we we really wanted to focus a lot of we asked ourselves you know how can we provide information to the board and to the broader community that is clearer and more transparent and you know so we we we decided that we were going to start by taking a by by modifying our financial uh financial report report and then ultimately to um to modify the budget book so we started we started with our monthly Financial reports and what

091we did for that monthly financial report just for clarity and just to add more more data just for for broader analysis is that we ex we added um a threeyear historical actuals I think the more significant item that we added for a monthly Financial was just pretty much the expansion are pretty much moving from Consolidated salary look to pretty much provide in all the object codes as as it related to to to salaries so from that are we then we we then NE next focus on the budget book next slide please so we wanted we let me we wanted to provide a a budget book really that really focuses um from a dished white P perspective really and holistic approach to to the budget book so we decided that the way to do that was

092to change a budget book from the cost center approach and to change it where was arrange by by categories and by the various object codes and the object codes which are fer to delineated by object codes by I'm Sorry by the cost centers um once again we wanted to provide data in a format that allows for more informed review and Analysis and we wanted the budget book to truly follow that Consolidated report um that in the front that shows everything last after the last budget cycle we we found or I found that there was a lot of questions and I did find myself repeatedly saying it's there but it's in this section it's in that section but all the information is there so we wanted the information as you look at it to be in

093one place and you can truly see what the makeup is um across the various cost centers and more importantly we wanted a budget that was really streamlined next slide please so what's new next slide so as it relates to the staff and summary um we've added to the staff in summary um the previous year's projected staffen we've also added a comparison as it relates to the actuals for for the current year actuals and also our comparison to the previous year's projection we've also added um a a few reports a report that shows historical staff and I do believe that goes as far back as fiscal the year 13 and when you look at that report and I'm sorry that didn't print away um in a colorful way it trly show you shows you the trend

094of the district and all the various changes that that has been made over the past couple of years so really just want to top provide that just some historical look and I I really think that's a very helpful document as you do look at it as at that document you do truly will see a history of the district and again last year the board did did request request and Arc chart um more so for the administration for this year we we expanded that Arc chart to be more of a dis requ AR chart um next slide you'll also notice a few a few new columns U there's a column that's called location that pretty much will identify the various cost center there's a column that's called current Services what current Services is is really taking

095a look at our current Services based on how it's provided for this year and then again from a Zer budget um standpoint or VI budget based approach we would then make any adjustments or any changes whether it has to do with enrollment which is a new column or a or a pro or a change to a program which is also here so and when you look at the budget book you're going to read the budget book from left to right you're going to look at your current Services your current services for the most part is going to is Pretty much telling you this is my current level lift Services pretty much this is where we are in fy21 and if you were to roll fy21 into fy22 this is our starting point from then we

096look at enrollment and then as you go to the book you will see all the various changes that we that was spoke about by Dan um and by and by liser and also at hbut and the whest with the ups and downs um you're also going to see a few changes there as it relates to a change in program for this year it's going to be a little bit not problematic but because of our we're providing Services as it relates to covid-19 um the change of program really doesn't truly reflect pretty much the services as it should have been provided for the most part um so this is pretty much taken where we are you will do you will find that in some areas our current service is lower than where we projected it to

097be for coming into fy22 but then we then true that up and that is reflected in the change to program next comment please so we did add a few a few changes to to the budget book as well we added a um in the budget detail tab um a summary by cost center which pretty much highlight the year-over-year changes by cost center and it further further highlights or identified by category what those changes are for this budget book and and again just to provide information that is just clear and just to provide um information to allow for informed decision we have added brief description for each object code so right before you get to the next object code you will'll have a brief discussion as to what that object C code entails we've also added

098for this year a three-year historical historical U of historicals and we have added this year a current fiscal year projection this projection is as of the last report that was presented to the board which was the November report um and again just just continuing from um from the fiscal year we have expanded um salaries and wages when you look in salaries and wages you will also find that the FTE for each object code is included there and it's also there and it all and it follows the cost center so above when you look in each category for salaries above you will find the salaries which is for the listed by the various cost centers just below that you will find the FTE and also the correspondent FTE for each cost center and again as I

099mentioned so each object code is further broken down by um object code is broken down by the various cost centers as well next slide please so I previously mentioned that um in terms of comparative um for this year as you look in Curr current services and just from a compar comparative perpose uh perspective it will be a little bit distorted and for in some of those various object codes and the main reason for that is just how services are being provided because of our operations um for covid-19 and again this will continue into into future years as we do look in comparatives um but we will do our very best to provide as much detail as we can that will explain why we do have these various discrepancies uh next slide please Phil do you

100want me to do these last two or do you want them oh please go ahead thank you so these are the last two slides and it's a natural place to end what's been quite a substantial presentation for you uh the first slide here reiterates for the board what you know well because you helped design this plan but certainly for the community and given this is recorded in a public record document very important that over the next four weeks a lot of work by the board with the administration particularly the cabinet plus and the principles to work through all the material we've been presenting tonight Plus what's in the board book added last year and is again in this year are a series of Workshops the first is tomorrow morning a 4our one if the whole

101time is taken from 9:00 to 1 for you as a board to engage actively on all aspects of the budget You' like to uh later actually next week is an a districtwide PTO session the PTO presidents have graciously said let's have one session uh they will help moderate that we'll do an abbreviated version of this presentation uh for the PTO that's worked very very well every year and they are great Partners at PTO president and putting that together it be via Zoom uh they'll moderate it uh we'll field questions etc etc but again very important point there for public input public comment parent input family input and then on the 21st is's a public form on the budget this will be the second year that you as a board have asked for that and and

102designed that and that's a chance again all this via Zoom uh to have uh questions raised uh for the board most likely Administration will field those questions questions on any aspect of this budget and then uh another workshop for you then on either the 26 or 28th is uh your scheduled to vote on the budget the 28th is your backup day but you may need that and we do put in here the deadline for the transmission of the approved budget to the the town the technical deadline is February 3rd uh uh but you have set a deadline of the 29th again so you give yourself a little bit of a cushion uh and then uh it's very important know that this budget then goes on for another couple months worth of work it really becomes

103the board's budget at at once you've adopted it but obviously with the administration uh joined we would then be presenting it to the board of Selectmen on the dates listed it then moves into very thorough review uh by the board of Finance they actually have the authority to vote on aspects of this budget and then it moves into uh an atbm and a budget referendum and then ultimately once budget adopted May 6 uh the board of finance will set the mill rate uh as uh this budget combined with the town budget to become the total budget for Weston what that may mean for the mill rate so this has been a very thorough presentation tonight we took the step to be far more thorough than last year a bit like we've been in previous years

104we hope this sets up a month's worth of work with you as a board uh we hope this uh gives you a piece to go back to gives the community piece to go back to to probe and understand understand uh this budget but I would leave you with this very simple thought on a complex process at a complex time we think this budget lets us as a set of professionals working for our families and children in Weston helps us Advance what is just a preeminent school system and to do that in what's a very challenging time but one where we are just focused from our hearts and what is best for the children and families of this town so at this point I'm going to stop the screen share and uh we can move into

105the next phase of the meeting thank you thank you uh um bill and the entire uh leadership team thank you for a really comprehensive presentation uh on the budget um I think we're definitely going to need uh you know what is setting up to be at least 12 you know 12 hours of of Workshop uh if not more last year we added a few more workshops uh in between um our challenge is going to be to uh methodically go through the budget um every line like we do every year um and so before we actually go through every page of the budget book which starts tomorrow um one of the things that we should do is limit our presentations this evening evening uh limit our questions this evening to the presentation um and then tomorrow

106at the workshop we can start at the beginning of the budget book and go go through so uh if there's questions now on the presentation uh maybe we can uh we can feel them we have we have we still have some time so um uh but we're going to definitely you know if we we will have a hard stop at 10 um so I don't know is there uh who who wants to start with questions on the presentation I can start I had one go ahead Melissa oh sorry Ruby um okay thanks uh I'll start you know at the beginning bill when you made your introductory remarks I was wondering you know how do we measure where our students fall academically as opposed to non-pandemic years so that we can gauge whether any additional resources

107would be needed to catch students up is there I'm I'm assuming you've probably gone through that analysis but maybe you can you can help us with that yeah I I think it it's it's it's really the core question and and I think the team at the core should answer it because it's something that that we talk about as a Cabinet plus all the time we talk about with the principles all the time and uh so I I would ask maybe starting with Laura you could speak to it other principles chime in uh Ken you should chime in Tracy you've got a sense of this Mr DeVito you've got a sense uh but it's an excellent question and it deserves a little time because there's reason databased evidence-based informationally based reasons for all of you to

108be assured and families to be assured that growth and progress is occurring here so Lauren if you want to start and then just kind of move the ball around the room as as as necessary sure we are seeing um a lot of growth and progress with our students we collected beginning of the year data uh we did see some slight dips in in some grade levels in terms of coming back at the beginning of the school year um we've been working towards addressing those areas and we will continue to throughout the year um our students are very well on track to finish successfully finished successfully this year um we are still Gathering um you know data throughout the year and will continue to do so but um I feel very positive about where our students

109are and where they will um finish at the end of the school year and I would Echo uh what Laura said uh we are um we certainly did data GA gathering at the beginning of the year we did see um some dips um or or some some lack of growth I would say really not dips but lack of growth um from the spring um but since then we are really seeing growth We are continuing to monitor um students all the time we're um doing reading assessments and math assessments and we're really pleased with the progress that they are making and um I I think that we're feeling very positive that we will um continue to see that that growth and really know keep them um on track um to to end the year successfully and

110I would just say again we think that's why it's so important that we continue to mon our students and um the nwaa um the map test that we have given already for uh reading and math have given us a lot of that data um and then we look at that in data teams we look at it um you know with our uh counselors our psychologists our reading intervention uh teachers our math Specialists um and we really do that as what we call a universal screen to gauge how all of our students are progressing and and to interview when we need to in addition to the regular curriculum units uh that you know teachers do from year to year and I would say I mean I guess what one of the things that we're we're paying

111close attention to at the middle school is some of the habits of mind and and the work um the product uh Independence that's where I think we've noticed the biggest uh dip with uh the online learning component and the engagement with students and we're still you know obviously always um concerned about that and working to get better at that at the high school level I would say that the teachers are still giving um Quality formative and summative assessments that we really um strive to make sure that our curricular partners are giving the same assessments and we continually look at the student performance every teacher must have a measurable um student goal with specific evidence indicators of success and we really encouraged them especially to look at the subgroups of the students within a group that

112are struggling in how to make sure that they um you know progress um looking at things like the writing portfolio scores looking at data like who's going to The Writing Center who's going to the math lab um or why aren't they going um it I would just say it's it's a a continuous cycle of monitoring also compacting curriculum seeing what is the most important thing for them to know and to scaffold appropriately I guess I would also add that one thing that is good or bad um we're all on the same boat here in across the country um that you know with the remote learning doing the very best weekend uh practicing the skills that the students need to be able to perform successfully um when they go to college uh so um I'm very

113confident in what I'm seeing also so that um our students are um are performing well and that um our teachers have gotten much better at being able to match the uh appropriate instructional um strategy with their learning environments and use their uh using their technological uh toolkit if you will you know it's not easy um but that's what our main focus is I appreciate the principles giving a brief overview here of how we're looking at uh student progress um engaging growth this is a conversation that um those in the curriculum committee um at the very last uh December curriculum committee um we had a brief discussion on the assessment framework for the district both uh internal and external measures kind of setting the stage for our January meeting next uh Wednesday um and we will

114be um going into more depth with this topic which had come up at a previous uh board meeting as well and I think that's uh number one really critical to understand the framework of of what do we point to what do we look to um for Progress both quantitative and qualitative internal and external assessments and then you know how do we use that when a student is um uh needs a little extra support and certainly this this budget uh has the supports the interven Von services and the processes in place to help students um catch up to to devel have a prescription uh short term for students to to catch up to where they need to be so um you know I think we can also uh provide you uh greater depth on uh at

115the curriculum committee meeting um because this is such an important topic I'm so glad you you raised it Melissa it's on the you know it's it's on my mind as a parent I'm sure it's on everyone's mind Tracy did you want to speak to this at all I was just going to speak to the the Continuum of supports and services that are in place which I think can really targeted in in the last half of his comment there um we are seeing I I would say um a greater increase in intervention support for students who are present ING with social emotional concerns I just had a meeting yesterday with um the psychologists in the district but you know like the academic structures and supports that have been described by the building principles we're really targeting

116and noticing what those concerns are and addressing them as we would under any other circumstance and so I think we'll continue to rely on those general education interventions um you know we certainly hope that those are going to be effective but if for some reason they're not um within the realm of special education we are meeting students needs in other ways and within special education our modifying programs when needs have changed and maybe the supports and services that were previously appropriate need to be adjusted and let me just finish up by saying and I'm going to grab the image of Zoom I I think that fundamentally you as a board for years upon years have allowed this District to have the professional capacity to go after in address these kind of issues be they shortfalls

117due to a pandemic or anything else it may lead one of our students not to perform at the level where we would hope they would perform and the the zoom images what you see gathered here multiplied by the Sills multiplied by counselors psychologists and most importantly our teachers they're very well positioned to identify and address within their given day and given role those exact gaps you're worried about um and so that's why we're pretty proud of this 3.81 because it's a lean number but it does not touch any of those core talents and capacities and roles that would allow us to answer that really fundamental question because at the end of the day this budget has to deliver on exactly what you asked about Melissa and we think it will thank you I have a

118question um Phil first of all I just want to uh compliment you on the on the uh uh new an improved book I really appreciated all of the new additions it was very it was very easy to digest this year so so thank you I still have lots of questions but it was still very easy to digest um so one of kind of the big the big question that we've been talking about for a couple years and I know that we um sent you some examples of other schools in the districts providing this is a multi-year view and I was I we've we've been talking about it since I've been on the board I thought kind of we had that conversation and and we were uh gonna kind of follow Wilton's um model in the

119way that they present their three-year budget and then it's missing from this book this year so can you just kind of talk us through thought it is missing it is missing um again my apologies for that um but we will have it not for tomorrow but by the next session we will have that that report um we were just really just trying to focus on just getting the book uh the new book done and just getting it out to everyone um but by the next session we'll definitely have the report ready next session meaning next not tomorrow the next Workshop the next Workshop after tomorrow yes okay okay yeah I think following up from Ruby I think having that backward look in the book plus a couple of year forward look even though it's pro

120forma on the forward basis I think would would be very helpful to complete the entire picture and help us understand a little bit better what the stressers might be next year and the year after even though you know there are things that we're going to have to guess at a little bit no that I I definitely understood I I do have a note here my goal was to have it ready at least by tonight but um as you can as you tell even by just that late change that we had to make to the presentation um the focus really has been just to get this first lay out but we'll definitely have it by um the the next not tomorrow but our next session or or prior to that um before we get too far

121into the presentation I have a question on um enrollment the uh enrollment projection one is a clarifying question on on that SL with the bar charts what dates are we comparing um I can't tie out the numbers which which one the slide eight um well slide eight that would be uh comparing the FY this school year fy21 as of October 1st October 1ed dates and then f222 would be what Malone McBroom projected for this coming year and then what's important and I didn't draw arrows across slides because given 10 minutes before we presented this to you us the board got got an update correct but if you go to slide 10 yeah which is the typical look you're used to seeing on our weekly now almost weekly enrollment reports I I put there the numbers

122as of the seventh that as of today right that so you know we can go back and forth you as we analyze it's a differential and that's also right there it's a differential of 14 students uh between uh the 10th uh excuse me October and today and th that number spread across 12 grades so the budgetary impact there is is not it's not it's none yeah you know and the biggest difference is at the K level um and we've not gone out to ser surve parents on the homeschooling front and or the independent school front for K1 uh there was some modification in the calculation by Malone McBroom for the fy22 in slide 8 to try and pick up some of that but we can come back to that and discuss with you yeah I

123think not surveying yet almost done the reason we not surveying yet is as a family I may tell you I'm coming back I may not but can we Budget on that that that's the issue it's not going to Drive sections and all the rest well that was my that was my real question which is um given the variability we had based you know in the summer versus today um and where the students disappeared to and whether they're coming back and what are the stresses on the budget um if we do get you know where where are the stresses going to be on on class on um on sections if we do see a boomeranging back of some students and uh I guess that's a question to answer at some point over the next couple of

124sessions yeah well fortunat no it's a great question Tony fortunately we answered it and we can just bring it back to you meaning the report we presented you got two reports in November you got the Malone and McBroom report and then you the separate uh administrative report from us where we very specifically identified not by name but every student who had left uh K or one that we anticipated and so we that's a known number uh and the issue then is do we go through the process of reaching out to all those families and say what are your plans we couldn't so to speak Bank on those plans but we we know specifically so where your most risk I would suggest and risk is a strong word or maybe too strong would be that k

125group will they come back in my hunch is those homeschoolers will substantially come back in that that homeschooling number is Way Beyond but some of as we don't know what's going to be happening with the pandemic and the fall yeah right we don't we don't yet know our situation um so anyway but we'll keep it's definitely something to talk about and I would suggest very specifically we bring back that November analysis for you to to look at regarding that question um Bill I know that you said you were going to do your investigations with vdl students but the but the enrollment that you sent today that is in school and video correct well you have two charts you have so this this one it that you sent today that's total snapshot of of whether you're

126vdl or you're in school you're still enrolled in the district correct right so the vdl yes so for so so my question is because I don't think we've ever had um in a three-month span uh two month span three Monon span um a decrease of 14 students unenroll from the district so so my question to you is have we done investigation on those 14 students as to why they unenrolled from the district because while they're not in a specific grade in total it it does shift by grade um when you look at kind of what Malone and McBroom is saying we're going to pick up another 20 students from K to first grade another 19 students from first grade to second grade it does it does shift that number so so have you H have

127we gone out and understood like losing three students in 12th grade their senior year three students unenrolled from the district yeah well we those not yeah but that's not going to yeah so up through November we did so the big shifts the big numbers that were affecting things in terms of potentially affecting class size and thus your numbers of sections that shift was occurring you know really August into October we tracked all that that's in the nov report November forward or really call it you know late October because we brought that report right up to the the end of October almost in the beginning November we've not gone back from November on because the actual number shift since then you know just in what happened here this report yet five more students but you had

128five fewer so there's a lot of coming and going but since November it's pretty much evened out but I want to know why you're not you're not answering my question my question is I want to know why people are leaving our district and so if we've had 14 answer unenroll from our district since 101 I want to know why yeah and we know that that was in the October the November report you can go back and bring it back they were going off the upper at upper higher levels those that the big numbers leaving were at the K level in the early Elementary they were going off to homeschooling it's almost entirely homeschooling and some independent school and we can bring back forward that November report because that answered your it's not November B you're

129not understanding me I'm looking at January 7th right compared to 101 so does does are you telling me that November matches January 7th no what I'm saying is that if you what I'm saying is from October until the beginning of November okay that picks up the vast majority of the Delta you're worried about most of it happened then Ruby since then the Delta has been inconsequential and the last two reports are a great example it went the report in late December went from 235 to 2235 to 2240 now it went back down to 2235 like other districts around us around the edges you're seeing coming and going as fames trying to sort out you know so but I mean we can show that to you we can go back and say from October until early

130November but it's important to go back the big shifts that effect of we pick that up in that November report since then it's been sort of almost even coming and going yeah I can I think that's going to be um okay thank you I think that it's going to be important information as we discuss uh some of the early grade sections right that's right no and it's excellent to look at because I can tell you across the region if not the nationless it's Focus locally and in new Canan darianne Wilton Westport uh Greenwich this same exact questions getting asked I've gr approve their budget so that's done but others are asking this exact same question and enrollment is now one of those rather fickle areas as to how do you really get your hands on

131it and now that we're sitting in January not clear what the Fall's going to mean for us with the pandemic it's it's still an issue but we can we can piece it together as best we can yeah bill I mean we've talked talked about these V these new variables that have been introduced into the enrollment issues with people choosing to homeschool with the DraStic turnover in real estate that's it's an anomaly that hasn't existed in the past however many years um I think that we're all going to need to give ourselves a little bit of patience and a little bit of time um to really get those numbers as good as we can before we officially finalize and and I know part of this is I don't like Weston's budget cycle that the part of

132the Town budget that accounts for almost 80% of town spending theoretically gets approved at the end of January and then it just sits stagnant for another three months while it works its way through the through the process um you know that's just something we're going to have to manage um and I do think having very timely accurate flows of the in and outs of enrollment are going to be critical for us to be able to get comfortable with those numbers um I think another topic of conversation that's kind of at a bigger level um the continued elimination of K2 World Language I mean I know this came through curriculum um and it was something that the curriculum committee was still kind of wanting more information about what we could do to provide some semblance of

133World Language to our youngest Learners as they're going through so I think I would like to have you know as we work through the process not necessarily tonight um but a broader understanding of how we can supplement if we're not going to be able to fully fund you know our world language program to give our youngest Learners something um along those lines um I feel like we're getting beyond the presentation I and and I love this this question Gina because I want to dive into that one in particular in some depth but I I wanted to make sure we were just talking about the presentation tonight not getting into the line by line because I have a longer argument to make to in support of World Language so let me know if this is yeah

134I you know I think that support what you're saying Gina yeah if I could just step in for a second I think that um when you look at the way Phil put the presentation together and way and the way the book is put together I think that um one of the first things we should you know if if you remember how Bill how Phil ended this presentation was that there was a whole bunch of cuts which which uh the leadership team made that basically brought the number from what was originally five you know internally 5.4 to 3.81 which amounts to eight almost $900,000 in cuts and those are individual line items which I think the first thing we should be doing is actually reviewing every one of those line items because right that's um before

135we even get to page three of the book that's table one and table two which basically has every one of those line items every one of those cuts like we did last year we should go through every one of them have a discussion um and and um before we even go through the other parts of the book because I think there these are conversations and I I think there's probably five or six of those line items that we've continued to discuss every year um and I'm that we will have that same discussion this year and figure out what to do with them right Pony can I ask a question and maybe this is a question for bill um and it's a broader macro 30,000 foot question what sort of guidance have you received bill before

136today from the town um and other bodies around what were shooting for in this budget as far as a request I I think I think any you know any any guidance we've gotten is is through the tri board meeting and I don't think there was uh much much guidance there right and I was on I was at that meeting so I'm just wondering if there was any other um you know specifics uh targets uh no I you know I think there are I mean realistically there are uh some you know significant financial pressures facing the town those didn't go away so I suspect that the discussion uh at the board of finance and the board of selectman level will be difficult as as it is as it was last year and every year yeah as

137it will continue to be this year I think our our you know our our goal is to basically make sure that uh as as a board um we uh provide um the administration and and the leadership team with the resources they need to run the schools in an appropriate fashion and make sure those resources are allocated in appropriate way and that uh we don't spend any more than is necessary to provide I think then affordability around that is something that needs to be discussed with the board of Finance right um that's really all I think we can say at the moment thanks Tony yeah yeah I I I might to connect processes meaning we've as a leadership team work really really hard to bring you what we brought you I would it and then to

138connect that process to your process I I would endorse what Tony suggested here that very early on you look at what we have put forward as reductions and be it in the big book that that Phil's put together Andro this presentation it's really those slides uh slide 57 and and then if you jump down to other services slide 59 some really hard thinking went on by the leadership team as to that set of reductions and looking at it holistically in the sense of if you don't do this production what do you do instead and and what are the meanings so and the settlement allowance shift that's significant because anyone who's been around here for a while has known that this is brand new for us to bring forward cautiously as you heard Tracy say it

139cautiously uh willingness to to bring that allowance down and it's a significant number $150,000 so I I would just indorse early in the process you as a board kind of look to that set of reductions we brought forward what does that mean what might what may stay and what may not uh and it kind of connects your question Taffy is that we think 381 is a good number I'm I'm not sure Town leaders will think it's a good number given all the pressures they're under um and uh so I don't know if that Point's helpful to you um the the other thing that I I think and um I don't know if it's a tonight thing or probably probably a tomorrow thing but um Dan went through the technology uh replacement plan pretty quickly I

140think that requires a little bit more of a a methodical step through to go through the the details there also there was alternatives on how to fund it that we might want to discuss too because that probably didn't have a full board discussion as well I think there was a couple of discussions internally about potentially how you fund the six-year technology plan um maybe that we can talk about that as well um I don't I you know I don't know if we have time tonight or we do it tomorrow that's that's definitely getting into the weeds but um we can hold off and see if there's other other questions yeah I didn't want to boggard everyone's Time by going over the six-year technology plan at the initial presentation but we can absolutely whenever you're ready

141we can go over line by line so we're all on the same page with with what the the plan looks like sure yeah because I think again the leadership team feels very good and it's really DeVito's work working closely with Phil and Ken to bring you in a major portion of the budget bring you a multi-year so you've you've got a multi-year look there and we had it previously we kind of got away from it a couple years ago so Dan's brought that back very substantively very specifically and so we would really you know ask the board to Grapple with that six year we really hope you would commit to that long-term View and obviously as you know any plan you may shift as you get into the out years but that front end issue

142is significant you know because those laptops are needed uh it's it's it's gotten to be quite dire quite dire um for our teachers and then the question is how do you pay for that do you lease them or do you buy them and that's that we've run the analysis we've run it a multiple ways so as you as a board grapple with one we hope the commitment to the six year but then two how do you pay for the front end that's what Tony speaking to uh Phil and Dan can guide you through that in great great detail Phil on page 51 you talked a lot about transportation in your presentation um and it's almost 533,000 or 1% of the increase for this year is there an opportunity for us to kind of uh evaluate

143on an ongoing basis um our current scenario of Transportation versus going back to the old way of transportation so not having the third party involved because if if if I remember correctly in your presentation you said Transportation alone was a 6% increase um so it it are we constantly looking at these yearly increases using a third party and whether it would behoove us to go back to kind of our original vertical methodology of using our our own buses yes so that that's just two parts to that so firstly the 6.5% only relates to the yellow school buses um so that's the the first student as it relates to the out of distri um transportation that is really based on the individuals that we have at any given year so we do tend to review that

144um in just on a year-over-year basis in terms of um whether or not it's more viable I can definitely say that as of right now it is still more viable for us or more more more financially beneficial for us to continue to Pro to use a third party to provide out of District um transportation if I also might jump out clarifying question because Ruby you mentioned on that this is slide 51 the bulk of what's happening on that slides not Transportation it's the out of District tuition and settlement so this is an other services area the transportation numbers uh We've really gotten that under control I mean the board to your credit really pressed us on that last year and thank you Phil thank you Tracy for coming in both for our regular students and

145for special ed that's under control you know the problems you had last year we have had none of that but on this sheet 51 uh the Big Driver there no pun intended is to get to that 553 is actually the out of District tuition and settlement number it's not a transportation number if I I'm sorry I think in the details Page by line item then we'll get to it tomorrow I think there was still anywhere between a four to six% in transportation but we'll get we'll get to it by line item then no I no I hear that I just thought I heard you say the 533,000 number was substantially tied to I just wanted to clarify as we see it that's that's tied to a different issue yeah well you know the the question

146on um the thirdparty transportation is not really I mean it's it's the reason why you'll continue to get questions about it is not because of a $116,000 increase it's because of the $770,000 basee cost you know that's that's the reason why you you know it it the increase is is is modest compared to the base cost it's always going to be a question about are we still relooking you know has anything changed in terms of uh the model we you you know you know still using third party versus bringing it inhouse I'm assuming them you know the the analysis hasn't changed right no the the the analysis hasn't changed as as it relates to using a third party provider for out of District transportation and there's a lot of benefits in in terms of using

147that third party provider there's a lot of flexibility that that provider has that we currently do not have because even just within our past year in terms of the just of various services are just how other schools are operating similar to us we've had to make a lot of shifts and this needing to provide transportation um whether it be providing extra AIDS or just providing additional um additional vehicles or drivers so excuse me in a pinch in a pinch a thirdparty provider can provide that in a pinch Weston would not be able to provide that and then Weston would not be providing the service that is needed for that particular student um for them you know to in order for us to satisfy that student's IEP so from a from just that perspective um I

148definitely think that um it is a better is it is continues to be the better option in addition to that we we continue to find um that finding drivers is still a problem problematic um first student you know just just Nationwide everyone still struggles to find drivers whether it be for for a bus or for the regular vehicles I have um a quick just a couple comments first of all I think we're off to a really good start I I really want to thank everybody for putting in the time and and Phil and Andrew I think uh you know you really turned around uh you know versus what I I saw last year at least and in this process is you know what I try to do is I like I like to look for

149themes and you know one one theme that's clear to me is you know I I I hear very clearly um and I just want to call out like both both both Tracy and Dan you know Tracy looking at a process how things were you're functioning making a change and really thinking actively about how the services are being delivered um and and then on the on the technology front you know Drawing the Line in the Sand saying hey we have to retool the teachers that's that's that's no negotiation right so so so when I think of of those type of themes I just think about the other areas in the budget that that I think we should keep on pressure testing which is a parallel process to the budget it's not about the discrete numbers themselves

150but you know what are we doing to change the delivery of curriculum what are we doing to change counseling what are we doing to change um foreign language what are we doing to change you know nursing in the light of you know covid um so those are the type of things that as we go through the budget I think they they go along the line items but um I would just urge everybody to you know pressure test you know how we're doing things which sort of fits into you know when we start looking at that three-year plan if we don't we're not if we're not able to to do a change in in this this uh budget cycle it's something that we can put as a placeholder you know for the for the three-year plan

151right so um just just just a comment in terms of of of thinking about the three-year plan and and and more discreetly how how changing the way that we're delivering the education overall I I had I had another um highle question I mean Victor your comments were great I agree with everything you just said um I did and this may not be a topic for discussion tonight but I wanted to tee it up so that we can talk about it whether tomorrow or at the next workshop and that's the decision not to invest in the Middle School on the capital budget I I I didn't I didn't love it last year and I I continue to not love it um regardless of the facilities optimization committee's recommendations you know we're years away from acting on

152anything relative to the middle school right I mean the bonding I think is up in 2024 so I'm not sure how the school can operate in the short term with without investment um for basic upkeep and Improvement and um when we make a decision to say especially in the budget book that there's just not going to be any investment in the Middle School what I'm not seeing are what are the things that if we weren't making that decision what are the things that we would consider investing in the middle school so i' I'd love to hear from whether it's Dan or Mike or um Phil on on on what are the areas of the middle school that are really in need of capital investment so that we can we can make a decision about whether

153those are truly short-term or long long-term needs Melissa let me jump in quickly but because we all agree with you we totally agree with you uh but you know we've worked this now for several years last year anything related to the middle school once it was passed the Board of Ed um and it was even clear this fall through the facility committee working in the building committee that because of the big questions about be it a three site and they're saying now three school campus whatever that you know puts in big question middle school but we couldn't agree with you more the Middle School needs investment and we couldn't agree with you more this is several years um and uh I've been very direct about some of the failings in the middle school and I

154I know that I've not made people in Weston happy uh we produce great scientists but looking at the science labs in the middle school I'm sorry the worst I've seen in my career I couldn't agree with you more and the hallways the locker Improvement was a big plus for 780,000 getting something else like that in you know the quality life so we agree with you totally but I think it's really now a board level question to have conversations with other Town leaders about this uh but we can show you very specifically what Dan DeVito and his faculty says important and that's what Mike Dom Mastro's identified from a very technical standpoint and Phil but I think that's where we really need the board to say hey we think there needs to be short-term investment in

155this facility and we can then show you what that would be yeah that I think it would be helpful to see see what some of those things are I mean I have the list from last year of course but um and you know there's also you know I think that's addressed in the budget book too there's a there's a list of the of Middle School items that are priority items in the budget book but I think that you know one of the things that we have to avoid is um like every year we're too exhausted by the end of this to you know to dig into the capital plan I you know honestly it's sort of the last thing we do and I think we have to actually give it uh a decent amount of

156time in the workshop and actually have a serious conversation about the middle school with uh the other Town boards maybe we should start with capital budget I mean it's just an idea yeah why not I mean I you know um sure let's let's talk about it in the morning and see if we want to do that Phil was want to give Mike a heads up don't Master our heads up yeah we want to do tomorrow I don't I don't know that we he I think he can be flexible we just have to make sure he can be part well it doesn't have to be the first thing but let's discuss it in the morning and you know and just give Mike a heads up if we want to do it sooner versus later any other

157questions comments all right that might be that might be it for tonight um give give everyone back some minutes oh you have you have public comment you need to turn to was posted on the agenda is having public comment so I don't know if you're ready that June because the agenda had listed as the last item hi Bill um I just looked at it again there are no public com comments tonight can you yeah thank you Jim heard you no great I I think this was a great start I mean we have a lot of work to do but uh I thank you again for a very thorough presentation and a good start to the budget process so um so we reconvene at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow morning um and what we'll probably do let's let's

158make a decision in the morning as to how we want to handle the capital budget and then start uh going through the budget book any other questions or comments for this evening no great uh can I have a motion to adjourn I moved great um second second and thank you everyone all right thanks everyone see you in the morning good night night good night thank