BOE Meeting (February 1,2024)

001you anything and possible EX for so St next Tuesday question e every so I come time cre pi ref the um business operations committee uh met this morning and so um as you'll hear in a minute we just did a brief um overview of kind of where we are with the budget process um we talked about the uh forthcoming joint meeting that's going to take place um next Thursday and I'm just you know laying the ground if they have questions we want to make sure the agenda is tight and then we'll have a um if there any other committee reports I don't believe so um so we can move to um the financial report and we have Don here yes hi thank you good evening um we talked about the financial report at the community

002meeting as well this morning um not a lot is different from the last month's report it's just day-to-day operations as you can see the numbers just keep taking up up one of the concerns that we are seeing um for the uh with the notice from the state of Connecticut and the change and the ECR calculation and the C of money that is available out there um along with the um unbudgeted about 158,000 for the um maintenance and repairs at The Cider Mill and middle school or Middlebrook uh schools I recommend that we start freezing the budget at this time in order to be able to cover those expenses is um should we come in short with the ECR money we have 1.2 million that's kind of a lot and then we're not anticipating that we're

003going to get what we expected plus the um additional funds so um I'd like to propose tonight to ask the board to that we freeze our budget um starting tomorrow um okay we don't need board approval to do that we'll just know we'll just implement the freeze I will be freezing the budget as of tomorrow sending a notice out to all um stuff other than that we just had a couple of transfers pretty simple transfers um just some year end athletic transfers for some transportation and um membership great the freezing of the budget well we made it a couple months further this year the did we did last year um I I'm sorry if you could just the repeat the number the the difference that we expect you know the difference what we were expecting

004in ECR and what we think we're going to now be just just over 100,00 just over 100,000 and so we were um this so not to belabor the story but in the banian budget the state had actually increased the am amount of money to feed the um excess cost Grant um we were anticipating reimbursement rate of somewhere between 80 and 85% as was every other District in the state um what we learned about a week ago is that that number um may have been under represented and so um consequently our first round forecast is nowhere near 80 or 85% reimbursements actually close to the 68% and so the net difference about that is um you know give or take 100 $30,000 um but in our very narrow budget that we have this year we just

005can't afford to um to leave that to chance um so I think you know Dawn's recommendation for freeze is a good one are there any besides the ECR and just the general sped watching that we do are there any other lines that are causing any um pressure points in the budget we're watching some lines but not to the point where we put it in writing now that there's a concern in that area it's electricity is one that's ticking up and then we're keeping an eye on substitutes that seems to be a little bit higher trending than what we are used to seeing at this time other than that I think we're we're within budget still on both lines we're in the budget all the way around it's just uh given that we still have quite

006a few months left to go um yeah we want to be a little bit more cautious with our spending so substitutes High because the absence teacher absences are higher than I don't know as if it's specifically teacher absence or if it's the fact that it's more certified teachers that are subing than um substitutes and that was that that legislation change that if a teacher substitutes that they're covered at their last salary rate versus a substitute um fre of pay yeah we have to look at it more carefully because I have we used to have them broken out between certified and uncertified subs and now they're just on one line so just need to look at what the ASAP says it is this cing yeah I haven't noticed a like a differential in Step apps since

007year-over-year at this time um so we just we have to dig into the number and see what's driving the the recent inflation thank you Don anybody have any other questions for Don and so next is to um review and discuss and we have school climate which correlates to Bo go 67 and 27 and I invite Kim and Company to come on you guys come why don't we bring some chairs up and then you guys can introduce yourselves why you come up and join us Co up here so thank you for having us I'm excited to be here tonight with some students they're going to be I'm going to do kind of an overview of climate but when we get to the prevention side um turn it over to um some important information to share regardless

008we've been doing and I'm here with is a junior and Chloe de BR who's a 10th grader andana um which uh she is I thought she was a sophomore but she's actually a junior I get S so so again good evening thanks for having us and um talk a little bit okay so um start off just with the overall Wellness goal um that we have for um this year which is 85% of students District BL will demonstrate age appropriate social emotional skills as measured by the Desa and the best which is our um Universal screening tools um excited to say that we're on track with that this year and so under our goal we really look at two areas um seal which encompasses our screening process um and our seal uh curriculum which is embedded

009across the district as well as uh School climate which is really kind of the overall um physical emotional and uh intellectual state of the safe learning environment in the school how we build positive uh School climate across the district to talk about both of those again broad overview um and we can you know dig into more specifics uh in the future so I wanted to start out with talking about our Universal screening um which is where we use assessment data to measure students seal skills and then we also do screening um in the area of at risk behaviors depending on the grade level of of students that we're looking at and then this um screening tool is implemented as our F process for social tion for really trying to catch kids early on put some

010interventions in place um to uh mitigate more uh challenging problems in the future and districts are really slow to adopt uh the screening although it is recommended by the National Association of uh School psychologists as well as the national Center for social um for school mental health um and psychologists uh and mental health researchers it's seen as one of the best strategies for student mental health so I'm really excited that um this has been place in our district and um around 22% of schools are using this um at particular grade levels 10% are using it at all grade levels so I feel like we a really good job um with being able to put some prevention Tools in place um we use the Desa you'll see here um our first uh rating uh happened at

011the beginning of the year about 4 weeks in we're in the process we rate three times throughout the year with the Desa that'ss and grades 8 through five um and you can see here uh 28% of our students were in the strength range 70 in the typical range and then there's U only 2% that need instruction really kind of targeting those kids and trying to move them forward this is a um assessment that the teachers um use it's not done by the students so um it's one piece of the when looking at um student social emotional skills and is really a straight based measure um it is something that is supported by the state so parents have the option to opt out which is why you'll see such a high percentage of ofation the best

012is a different tool that looks at at risk and that tool is a student uh student report and you'll see 45 to about 47% uh participation rate we do this at particular um three right now 3 six 8 um and nth grade is where that tool is embedded it's a lesser participation rate because with this tool parents have to um have to give consent so um it definitely is up from last year so it's something that you know we're getting uh we're trying to advertise and make sure parents are aware that this is an option and again you'll see the rates um 98% storing the typical range 10% are elevated and very small percentage reated So based on those scores we put uh interventions in place and then we use our um srbi process to

013kind of monitor the interventions um does the student need a more intensive support did that intervention work um and then we review this three times throughout the year it really informs our interventions moving forward and then we have our programming which is really the SEO curriculum that we're doing across the district we use ruler program um at the elementary we the core components at the secondary level um DBT is really the focus at the secondary level in terms of skills I know we've heard a lot about that um everyday speech is um actual curriculum right now that's embedded in uh K and one and we'll be moving up to grade two next year and then the really exciting thing with the grant we were awarded we have a newal inventionist which right now primary focus

014is um at the elementary level and really this is to support teachers in um helping them with implementing the curriculum in their classroom the tier one interventions for students again really at a um prevention level to try to catch those and support teachers uh early on this is just a visual of kind of what we're doing and where we're doing it at what grade levels uh the one thing I didn't talk about is we have the SOS program which is a suicide uh screening tool we do that in grade 10 um and we're piloting it in grade seven year again that's something parents need to opt into um and then our Panorama survey which is done um with all students there is an option to op out but this is really looking at school climate

015and um wellbeing um and I presented you've heardly come to a board to present on those that that we use um every years and in the past there wellbeing indexes and students that can ask for more support using that tool as well so now we're moving into the school climate um goal and that's you know the uh the focus with climate is around building community and connection and I talk a lot about connection and I was excited last weekend when I was at the Harvard um School mental health conference when um there's some new data out to support climate um to support the connectiveness it's something we've been focusing on in this district for um over five years now you'll see are um survey data coming out of the Panorama of the last three years

016where we've been taking data around um connectedness and relationships so this is um this encompasses a variety of questions under how connected students feel with peers and adults um in the school setting and you can see that um this has increased uh over the last three year so we're um we're happy with these results because this is going we focus on quite a bit now when you look at um National Data 46.6% of students strongly agreed or agreed that they felt close to persons at schools coming out of the CDC so we are well over um what the National Data is and I'm just going to stay with connected this for a minute this is the information um coming out of the conference which again how connectedness you know what's a protective factor and how

017it supports students mental health so again when you start to look at students connected in school the prevalence of mental health um is lower for those students persistent feelings of sadness and hopelessness um it's a prevention factor for um suicide as well seriously Cons considering attempting and uh having ATT so again um you know it's an area we'll continue to focus on because although our numbers are are moving in the right direction you know there Stills that don't feel connected how to be work on you finding out who they are and trying to ad um an ongoing Focus so when we talk about climate it's really this is important it's the feel of the school so it's attitudes and behaviors and points of view um experien by students teachers and stakeholders so it's an individual

018experience you're going to hear from our students a little bit about that so while one person may have a great experience it could be very different for someone else so it's really important that we're inent intentional about how we create inclusive and affirming and safe communities for all and all is the keyword there because again for some students it's a great experience and for others it's not and we really want to work towards um School climate being uh a safe place for all students there's one more slide around connecting this this is um the most recent data when asking our students do they have at least one adult of their and again you'll see High School 7% Middle School at 82 and at oops um and just talk a little bit about the safe School

019climate um components to the law so uh schools are required to have a safe School climate plan um in under that plan uh we need to do a assments every two years you have flexibility of how you do those assessments you do those five particular grade levels but uh in Wilton we we um do all students um 3 through uh 12 using the Panorama survey and then we create an in-house survey for our um most little students but we do collect data for elementary as well we also um survey parents as well as staff uh each School needs to have a clim committee that again reviews the data and um implements action plans as well as a district which we just had our meeting uh last week we're required to have a safe School climate

020coordinator as well as building specialist um that serve as the climate specialist for each of the building um we're required to have mechanisms for reporting concerns anonymously and this is some recent data that we're um glad to see because we spend time uh really sending the message uh to students about something say something and how to report uh concerns so we have um software uh called speakup where students can um anonymously report a concern and 88% of our students in 3 through 5 93% in 6 through 12 um responded favorably there whereare are the ways to report um concerns specifically around immune behavior and bullying they also get monthly email reminders um for our secondary students our uh three five students don't have email but they they get monthly reminders to shaking your head you

021get those reminders um again just um to report concerning behaviors and we've also added in um The Suicide Hotline as a reminder to stud students if they need support um and then investigating um when a a ping report is made we're required to investigate that and determine whether um whether we can substantiate often times we can substantiate that certain things have happened whether it meets the criteria for uh being a verified Act of bullying is something we really have to kind of um spend our time looking at and often times that can be um where things can be um I think tension can lie with families because we can confirm that things have happened but it may not rise to the level of bullying um whether it does or not I work with the school

022teams around putting interventions in place to support students because it's um we can do a lot to support students and um really whether it is verified or not we don't have to kind of get caught up in that when we're putting intervention plans and trying to uh stop the behavior um it's challenging a lot of um what the schools are dealing with is happening outside of school and social media so investigations can involve many students and can take a long time to sift through that and find out find enough facts to be able to um make a determination um and staff are required to report um anything that they see or is reported to them as well um and go through annual training okay so just do a quick overview um a quick overview of

023just the impr uh School improvement process so um this should be Su but basically we want to gather input from our key stakeholders and evaluate that that um that input and then data collection and we have a uh tool um in place that I think is meeting our needs well um then we review the data and set some action plans around areas that we see are important um to uh try to make some Headway there's lots of data so it's picking an area where we think we can you know um really make an impact and we're looking at that uh from the student perspective as well as staff and then um the parent Community as well um and then action planning and then resurveying again to start the process all over so we're that's in

024place on a a two-year cycle um so we're currently in the process we survey well we mooved to a new tool and we're ready to survey uh right when Co um shut us down so we it's been a while since we did a comprehensive school um climate survey but we did survey students during the pandemic around their wellbeing and um some seal skills um so we are in the process uh that survey um administered over about a 4mon period just um because it took time um in moving all the key stakeholders through those surveys and uh fitting time into the student schedules as well as staff so we're in the process of um action planning and um implementation you'll hear some of the things that um that the students will talk about um as we

025um move forward I can tell you with the district climate uh meeting the area of um parent engagement was our lowest score and something that all are kind of looking at how can we engage parents more in work and communicate more about the work that we're doing and what tools you know might be helpful for them at home uh we're also looking at uh the idea par University to really kind of focus on some of the behavior um that we're seeing and how social media um interacts with that and then what as um tools for parents and how the school and the community can really partner because I think to tackle some of the issues that we're seeing um really needs to kind of be a partnership between school and home to um figure out

026how best to address and support students dat still March 7 ex um and I think yeah I hope that take to long I think you really want to hear is from our students um who are actively involved in prevention programs that um have high school and it's it's funny they're all our hook Squad members but that's not how um they seem to be we invited to come here to share a little bit about a new leadership program that we embarked in training this week and then um they all landed in that program through different clubs and activities that they're involved in or staff recommendations but the the line is um they're all H Squad members which they to talk about as well so I'm turn hi I'm Tiana my hair is a little different from

027when I took that picture but it's still me um so the first thing I want to talk about during the leadership Workshop we had on Tuesday we did an activity called The Frequency activity and that's where a high pitched was play that typically only students can hear and adults and teachers can not just do people age and that activity was used as a metaphor to show that there is always something going on between the students and that teachers and staff every day in the school walk by and sometimes they get SE always there could be a student another student because they can't see it they can't understand it SL they don't have the same social media they're not any problems and the speaker who is there running the leadership Workshop use this activity as an

028example to make students feel feel empowered as a way to realize that there's things going on between us that we need to lead in a way so that students can help other students if the teachers can't see the bullying or the hateful or the unkind Behavior that's going on in the school so the purpose of the cultivating leadership program was to empower students to lead by example um to Model pro-social Behavior Uh as well as to just develop empy and students um High School um in general has noticed these like qualities and skills have lacked so by um creating like a program and having students who show like the leadership skills to um come together and try and build these skills um it would hopefully um increase the school climate and just like the students

029in general um so you might be a to wondering um like what we were take we took away from this activity um and for me oh sorry I'm CL for me it was mostly about like leadership is about the relationship that you make with the people that you're leading and you have to be able to communicate your ideas across instead of the final product and a lot of leaders get um they get mixed up and they're only searching for the final product but really like the most efficient way to get the best final product is through creating relationships with your team um and then I also connecting back to the um the frequency activity that K was touching on we did another activity where um we all had these um dots we all had these

030dots we had four dots um um they were rated based on how much mental space each topic takes up in your in your mind like throughout the day and there were like 25 posters around the room there was like body image Sports grads drugs and alcohol like violence um what else is there there is like the future family issues but like all these and So like um after we all went around you could see like the future and grades took up a lot of kids space and this is out of 100 kids so I mean this is a lot of dots but then in comparison pure pressure had none which was like and obviously and as well as the drugs and violence which was like I remember he said like obious you can take data

031from the posters that have dots on them because you know a lot of kids are thinking about college in the future and their grades which I mean also me as well but he was like there are definitely kids that have an unhealthy relationship with drugs or Andor experience peer pressure but it wasn't a safe space to like admit that you experience so I just thought that was like such a like Nuance idea that I've never heard of before um and so connecting back to the students thing like creating this community where everyone is is like verse and able to communicate with each other is so important and such a good it'll just improve our school in the student body so much more than I don't know anything else like that's a very big priority and

032you know wasn't I had no idea what you know we sent out an invitation to probably close to 130 140 students and they were students that were involved in our Dei work our school climate um athletes uh captains who are in a leadership role um uh students in uh link crew students that are already facilitating in advisory um and then teacher recommendation and we had um we ended up with about n um respondents who could come a few kids had to drop out due to some academic stuff because it is during the school day but we had 99 participate so um that was exciting um 99 kids that can hopefully now um there's one more training and then they're going to be running some activities in advisory and taking these skills um out into the

033community so um we're really excited about that and then you want to take a minute or a couple minutes to talk about Hope Squad which fits very nicely um in all of this work um okay so I think I'm starting off the Hope Squad section so hope Squad we are all part of this club along with I think of like six other students that are all in all different grades we also recently sent out a form at the beginning of the year getting all new kids so we're hoping that every year we can refresh the population of Hope Squad members so that there's kids through every grade every friend group every sport you know just to spread ourselves out as evenly as possible how did the recommendations come in though because that's really important um

034so all of every student at the beginning of the year will receive a Google form that says that says nominate three people and explain why you would go to them if you needed help with suicide or really any mental health but like issues but if you were suicidal or had any issues with that like who are your most trusted students and all of us got recommended like more than five times some a lot more so like you had to get nominated to be in Hope Squad so we started off um training we went to comto for probably 5 hours 6 hours and we um we learned like multiple different warning signs and what to do if you see like someone that fills out multiple boxes or even just one so we're a suicide peer-to-peer based

035suicide prevention program and um we aim to be like the link between the counselor's office and the student body because it takes a lot to especially if you're in that mental state to just walk into your guidance counselor's office and tell them that you have a problem so we're either supposed to recognize in that that in our community or just refer um like what we see to our guidance counsel advisor and then they take it from there I think we've actually had how many referral three that have gone through which is like I mean it's horrible that that had to happen but it means it's working which like we always say like all this work is worth it we could say one person so the next thing I want talk about was the one activity

036that we did to show po Squad throughout the school we the month of May is mental health awareness month so during the entire month last year we had activities every day every Thursday we had um service dogs come into the library can just be with the service St one day we were out in the main lobby with a table set up and we were able to pass out kindness students were able to come up to the table write a kindness note to anybody in the school and then all Squad members would go out and deliver it to them during their classes we also had a brck payment day I believe in the library and we had a and we had announcements and just quotes on the loud speakers so that stud can just feel uplifted

037to start their day and we had a presentation on the slideshow that goes through in the middle of the school just kind of saying what hop spot is who the members are and who you can go to whenever you need and you are in need of help we also regularly pass out these bracelets um most I would say most of the student body has them at this point but it has the National Suicide and crisis Lifeline which is 988 which we broadcast everywhere and then our slogan which is it's okay to not be okay um I feel like we do other things too but there were like there were like about five probably 500 kindness notes like thebody really got into it and we loved it we thought it was we had no idea it

038was going to take it did um which just reminds us um the culture of kindness like we all knew that um so I our big effort in the first year was just promoting what the club is and that it's a place can go and I think we' we've accomplished that so more to come and then did you want to talk just a little about yeah I think that hope Squad really has impacted the school in climate it's made it definitely for me at least a Kinder place to be in and I think other students as well they feel more comfortable with being in F Squad but there still is a lot of not a lot but amount of De of unkind and mean behaviors throughout the school and throughout the student body and I feel

039that the school climate committee and hopes s are really working to make that a better place School climate just spoke with the instructional leaders and three students and including myself go to the instruction leaders and talk about the um personal experiences we had just with me and unkind behavior in the school and just give them an idea on how teachers can do a little bit more to help students and just be a person that students can go to whether that's during break time or that's in the hallway or something's happening to them makes the teacher walk by just having that student teacher connection so my students were comfortable and go to them and we also talked about how we need to make sure that students know that it's important to be kind to one another

040because I feel like students know how to be kind but they're not implementing the kindness so um just climate and hope Squad hopefully can use like the leadership programs that we have the mental health awareness day all the programs that we do in throughout the high school which just helps students to really implement the kindness and treat each other respectfully really great yes of question really great so we're working on it the leadership um this was the was this the PTA Grant yes thank you you're welcome this was sponsored um co-sponsored by the U the PTA the high school PTA and we won an award through the national PTA helping minds Grant to help us supposed to be the first thing I said it's been a week it has so the PTA has been Partners

041um I'm always bringing ideas and they're right there to help write the Grant and um partner with us so really excited about that and Michael Fallon and his partner um Dennis Michael Fallon is a a keynote speaker that has spoken to our student body um spok to freshman this year he does a theatrical um kind of presentation spoke to a 10th and 11th graders last year he's been coming here for many years so this was a a workshop you know that he does with his partner um and you know there's a storytelling piece to it that I think was um very relatable to students and um kind of just just empowering uh then with steps forward because it's going to take us all together to kind of shift the time like you have to know

042the person to build a relationship to then create the most successful final product you can as a leader so does the H squad meet sort of every day every other day are you just like a group that goes out there it's a club um yeah so we meet every other Friday morning um to plan um you know what activities we might be working on as well as kind of are referrals are there any concerns um with students in community also always planning events and stuff like there's always something do you have some other some boys in the Hope yes the president of the student body okay m col yeah we try and keep it like pretty like equal like grade wise just try and get the most amount of like people that we can to

043like relate to like different types of people within the school and then also like when it comes to referring and having like a trusted person to go to then you're like influenced in every single Corner that we can right different like social groups is like important as well like we have a bunch of like athletes and then we also have just like a bunch of like theater kids like it's just like a lot of different kind of so then the recommendation process is intensive theth theater people the musicians exactly hope yeah so I love this idea of feeling like empowered to be able to then raise your concerns with with adults in the building and I just um you know would love to hear if like you have thoughts over like changes or things that

044you've seen that you think adults can help to facilitate you feeling um empowered in that friend I know you talked about connect connections and connectedness and I know that that comes from having a trusted adult but I guess also within the kids um themselves but then kind of you know feeling empowered as a as to advocate for yourself but then also you know having adults sent out that signal that that empowerment is is welcomed um conversely so I didn't know I was just curious if there was any activities or things that you felt like changes that have been done or you'd like to see um I when we did like Kiana was talking about um the kindness notes we did that once and we got hundreds of letters um or like little notes and the

045second time we did it we got an equal if not more amount of notes so um and the notes were like really cute they were like to sometimes they give to teachers but a lot of it were just to like students themselves just like saying like I hope you have a great day or things like that and like even just throughout the day I thought that there was like a better like atmosphere at the high school like everyone was like either like when people when we would like ENT cost still the notes it would be like a bunch of like anticipation like oh my gosh like who's going to get the letter like or like you would just like go and you be like oh like when we did it last year I wanted to

046send one to my sister so I like wrote one to my sister or whatever and I she coming home and she was and she was like thank you so much like it just absolutely made my day so I it's just like things like that where it's like a just like a little bit of kind just goes like the longest way um and if we can keep that in people's minds but I feel like it it wasn't like a competition at all like also people had so much fun like writing the notes and writing to teachers like people would come and write like five or six notes like it was just a and everyone was smiling you know they were like all over the floor like questions one of the big things for us to tackle

047is you know I think some of the behavior that's happening is in friend groups and it's consider joking and it crosses the line and um it's or it's not funny at all but nobody nobody's giving feedback about that and so that's where I think the empowerment where students can start to say hey that's not okay we don't we don't stand for that here um and I think faculty Alik you know when if we're not sure then intervene so um yeah that's an area Focus right so Kim can I ask a question about that for ladies thank you U you know Powerhouse is here and for you know forces for really positive change at the high school and it takes a lot of courage to put yourself out there in front of your peers takes a

048little bit of courage to come and sit here in front of this group so um you're brave and you're doing great work I have a question about kind of that phenomena you just named and Kiana had named it too right so this kind of mean behavior that occurs in friend groups that people that kids are trying to be funny or whatever the case may be um K you started and said um you know when you guys had that activity the other day um it was an exercise where you can hear a certain tone but adults can't and something that's occurred to me a long time ago is that adults often don't see it and so how do you marry those two things if adults don't see it how do you bring it to their attention

049so they can intervene appropriately at the time I I would say either through us like the students themselves or just maybe being more actively aware like I know a lot of this m Behavior goes on during breaks because we do have five 10 minute breaks and that happens in the hallways and that's where most of that behavior comes out but during those breaks I know teachers have to take their own breaks but maybe stepping out into the hallway and just watching the students and see how they behave and and then if they see something that might be mean or see students laughing at each other maybe interviewing them and saying like hey what are you guys talking about not like saying oh like come with me you're in trouble but just saying like what are

050you guys talking about this might not be what you guys should be saying or this is not okay this person might feel xwi also as Miss was touching on like students should be able to feel empowered enough like to report themselves whether it's anonymously through speak up which we get mostly emails about or um you know they can talk to us we very like very much dress I think all of us have had people come to talk to us whether it's about you know what we present like all the time like three times we've done it like how to help like what are healthy and like not healthy ways to cope with stress which a lot of kids struggle with at our school um but yeah I think through the speak up through all of

051the resources that we tell about 988 the Tex hot lines and like the teachers and staff like regularly trained I do you do you guys get a chance to kind of sit down with teachers and like tell like let them in on kind of signals or things that they should see or like approaches that maybe when they see something how there's like a more successful way to kind of ingratiate themselves into you know the this the circle of kids to some extent you know cuz I think part of it the reason why adults don't see it or hear it is we don't really know so then even confronted with it we don't necessarily know what to do with it yeah we know say k and a couple other students spoke to the I team um

052this week to kind of begin that conversation of like this is this is what it may look like this is what was really going on and you know how can we um and then not intervening then it seems like you're conving the behavior but it's maybe in this joking context so I think raising awareness is um the first first step and you know empowering students to um to say something when they see it because they're going to know before we do and that Ian that's what hope squad's built on kids are going to hear about or know about the kids are going to go to kids before they're going to come to adults so how do we Empower students to be that first line so I think that's continuing to kind of do this work

053and have these conversations yeah I think it's really fantastic and incredible and you know Bravo to you know hope Squad and you ladies for for doing the work and putting yourself out there it takes a lot too and I hope that you feel that you have the support that you need because sometimes that can be an overwhelming position um for you to be put in as well so know that we recognize that and appreciate that too yeah I just one more question you don't have to answer tonight unless you have an answer uh so this board is a policy-making board and we have many policies around student conduct and student Behavior but as you're doing this work and thinking about how else you might um better support the change in the environment you seek at

054the high school are there policies that we don't have that you would like to recommend that we consider to support support these efforts so that's a big question you don't have to answer it unless unless you do have an idea see your wheels turning I got my pen ready I I don't have to like a specific policy at all like at all but I think that there definitely like should be a policy I think the only way to get to the kids which is kind of like sad but the only way is to like lead by example in like a bad way where like the people if like there's unkind Behavior I think they need to be reprimanded like not like very like like I don't know I think you know what I mean but

055like I think that there's so much un kind behavior in the high school and I think it's terrible obviously and I think the only way to get to these kids is like showing that example like um Mr rushan um he is the athletic director and he's implemented this year where if you are doing anything on Sportsman like whether you're in the stand or on the field you have to I think it's like a 2hour like Zoom course or something where you have to do just like watch a video about sportsmanship or on Zoom or something which is pretty tedious task and I just think something like funny like that that I mean it would definitely be good but just like some sort of punishment it's kind of like okay this is probably I don't know

056if this is the right thing to say but um like when teachers if teachers say that something isn't graded then a lot of kids will just like sit back like you need to put some weight on it so that there's there's something to L so what I hear is you're saying there there ought to be consequences for behaviors 100% yeah okay but noted yes but I also think coupled with that is a way then to have the skills to not continue the education piece right yeah the after piece as well which is um the balance yes yes but um yeah if you do come up with any you know walking around the school saying hm if there was a policy that said you could do this or you couldn't do that feel free we're always

057um open to ideas and suggestions I just have to say these guys were so willing to come and like didn't didn't hesitate and not nervous I'm more nervous so uh just so impressed with bra veryy for a better world and yes yes it is here it is than apprciate well done what get rid of I know right yet yet we'll get it later don't worry don't worry about it thanks ladies I appreciate it thank you best means are when the kids come agreed mhm it's just crazy having seen them that's right they were yours weren't they they were my students and now in high school so it's really cool to see that it's a little scary cuz I see them when they're free and then that's even scarier that's really scary yeah no it's very

058cool to see I'm going to forget that you knew my kids when they were three cuz then it makes me get like older too um next on the um agenda to review and discuss um celebrations of the superintendent's 2425 budget um proposed budget which is goal number 12 great so I think if you want to start us off with a little bit of so we'll do an update yeah and then um we'll get into some different things so um first later on in the agenda and I I sent it to you uh yesterday I think is a lease proposal for technology equipment which we'll talk through in detail at that point I'm I'm asking for a motion to approve that so we can send the board of Selectmen and um ask them to approve it

059as well um in addition a couple of other areas we've been working on are in the area of Transportation so we had a bus consultant in from sta which is our you know primary um bus transportation provider working with Helen Walker our transportation coordinator to um examine routs um for the purpose of trying to consolidate and see if there's any feasibility of taking buses out of service which would also saved money so they just finished that work this afternoon their crafting recommendations I'll get those um sometime U probably by the end of this week I'll take a look at them review them with staff and then if there is anything we can do I will bring that back to you with a big happy smile so um stand by um there's you probably more to

060discuss there um the second area related to transportation that I've been digging into is the in District special education Transportation I shared with the board um we spend quite a bit of money moving kids around either through Community steps or through the Genesis Program and so um I developed a belief that if we purchase a couple of Vans and hire a couple of drivers we may be able to drive down some cost for that service too by bringing it inhouse as we've been exploring that one of the um barriers we've come up against is uh simply the uh Pro procurement time for Vans and so the lead time to acquire these things um According to some of the folks we've been talking to is anywhere from 10 to 12 months and so having something in

061place for um July 1 um does doesn't look likely at the moment so we're going to keep scratching at that and see if we can't um come up with something um we're also going out to bid for other services to see if if we can't do it ourselves in the short term is there a less costly advisor that we can a less costly provider um that we can uh utilize to save some money can I yeah I was just going to ask is there a way or a space where if the lead time is 10 to 12 months so we can't do it this year to be able to put funds forward to advance it for next year so we don't bump into the same a great question problem yeah stand by on that one

062so we going to ask the same question I wasn't no I was going to ask just why the long lead time is it inventory is it that there's there's specializations yeah I think it's inventory so Maria had that conversation so she's on Maria do you want to answer that question oh we have no sound oh no um do you know why we don't have sound um no all right well that's not part of the plan no sorry Maria stand by um we had audio and now we don't M open that back up by the microphone just see where it's saying your audio is coming out this is my it should be that if it's assign it to the camera oh it is assigned to the camera okay [Music] so Mar yes can you hear me

063now great thank you those commercials uh so yes it is an issue in of inventory I've spoken to um a number of dealerships over the past uh week and um I think without exception each each dealer that I spoke to noted that it's just very difficult to find inventory for these large vans that have you know capacity of T in up and um you know they're saying it's a lead time of about a year be more now we're not giving up and we're going to continue pursuing it and Ruth I think you said you know can we prepare so that if we're not ready for the 2425 school year we're ready for the following and that's that's the spirit in which we're approaching this process as well we're just going to keep moving moving forward

064it it's possible that they may be able to locate a van or two somewhere in the country and and from what um can you hear me yeah go ahead okay I'm just getting a little feedback I'm sorry from what um the uh different managers that I've spoken to uh have said is you know it may be possible for them to locate one and then perhaps um have it on site but they're they're not optimistic and they're just telling us to be prepared for very long wait times in the event that they can't find them and then of course you know there are other things to prepare for like the special um license that the drivers would need and the courses that they need to take and so we're right now working on um learning about

065all of that and accessing resources and other districts that have this process in place and as I said if we're not ready for the 2425 school year we're just continuing to move forward so that when the Vans are Avail will'll be ready for them thank you great the other area that we're looking at is uh within contracted services so for a number of years we have used a company hilard to provide all of our cleaning supplies all of our janitorial custodial supplies um recently and we have been um Piggy piggybacking on the New Haven Public Schools contract to get um really competitive prices uh earlier this year New Haven switched from hilard to cintus and so you know they called us and said do you want to switch so Jose has been conducting a pilot

066um with some of their materials at Miller Driscoll um for all of the custodial supplies they gave us very favorable pricing so you'll see that's one of the areas in the budget where the line is actually held flat um centus is a large company and they provide um a range of other services so um Life Safety Management um maintenance of aeds the list goes on and on and on so we're evaluating all of those other services um that we currently you know utilize through other contracts and if we can find some savings um through bundling all of these with a single company we'll proceed in that direction as well um so it's going to take a little time um to really sort that all out but it's it's in process and you know hopefully we

067can we can get some place with that um so those are the kind of the the you know the more major updates um we sent you another round of responses um as well as um all kinds of supporting documentation just to um thoroughly complete the answers um at some point when you're ready there were a couple of questions here about you know what would you add what would you take away what are the tradeoffs so I have a document I'll share with you tonight that we can kind of talk through in service to that question when we get there um but before that I just like to give you a moment are there other questions you want to dig in either from the first round um or from this round Heather also sent us some

068material so um we want to make sure we um talk about that too and the the principles are obviously teed up to to respond to questions thank you this is epic so I think I know that um you know Heather had sent in some questions and um suggestions last night and we'll Flo those into um the regular you know question document to make sure that um the written responses get put forth to um but if there are things that you would like to um bring up I know Kevin and his um staff are here to answer um questions sure and and let me just start by saying totally new to this don't know always what the right thing to do is so apologize if I overstepped any uh Robert's Rules of Engagement or or whatever

069it may be so um you know just going through everything and and thinking about you know looking at the budget thinking about the students thinking about our responsibility to the public and making sure that we're transparent and that we um truly you know let the public know that we have done our due diligence when it comes to reviewing the budget looking at the tradeoffs and the way I came up with these few slides and I'll just go over them is I looked at the things that um what I could from what I could tell were were not directly student facing so not instructional time um obviously I brought up the coaches last time uh we have a data analytics administrator which is and I couldn't I couldn't tease out what it was from that long

070item um so I don't know there were two administrators in that c Center so I'm not sure what it was I kind of split in the middle um and then the schedule change for cyber Mill an additional 82,000 and then um knowing that we already have coaches at the high school if we have coaches at the high school and if that stays we also have um all of these instructional leaders within those groups as well so knowing that they took the instructional leaders away from from Middlebrook when they put the coaches in just wasn't quite sure why we still had all these instructional leaders uh at the high school and we also have um all this coaching as well um and then I put this last piece in there just to kind of engage the

071conversation again of like buying this ridiculous State mandated curriculum which could be between 500,000 million dollars what are our options to say no um and what would potentially be the the cost to us for saying no so again just threw it on there to to re-engage in that conversation um and looking at those budget items I also want to just make sure everyone knows I'm not like I would love to raise the V by 5.6% right like I don't I don't think that you know I think there's tons of programs that we don't pay enough attention to um but I know that that's you know it's it's going to be very difficult so what I wanted to note were actually things that were already stated in Kevin's budget um in addition to a couple other

072things which were uh requests that the building administrators made but chose not to fill right so PA of professionals science teachers stem teachers sped teachers um knowing that those were requests that were just not granting because we don't have the budget and so for me that's a tradeoff um I see money being spent and again and I feel like I'm a broken record it's not that I don't see value it's that I want to make sure we're taking the resources that we have and putting toward you know the best of our ability within the schools and from from where I sit these types of r roles and these types of of spending are so valuable and I would hate to see us lose sight of that uh in addition to that you know I know

073it's been brought up several times but we have no um no business unit or no line item for uh gift and tal education um and we also I think it would be it would be great if we didn't have any unexpected maintenance costs next year but I think the chances of that happening are very slim um there are going to be things that come up and I think that we're all very cognizant of the fact that these buildings are aging and um having something set aside for us to account for that to be able to fix things when they do come up I think would be um would be a responsible use of our money as well so just wanted to put that together and then finally I just kind of bolded it out where

074I saw um some Creative Solutions that we could potentially look for we already talked about a few of these um and just wanted to again put it down have it for you know the public to look at for us to look at to have something in writing um that we could all reference if we need to and we could vote to you know if you guys feel that you don't want to address this right now and you vote to not go over it that's you know it's a democracy we can do that as well so um but I wanted to make sure that you know I got uh what I felt was important out on the table and I all of this well so process wise like the these your questions and suggestions land on

075the table like all our other questions and um suggestions and they get vetted through the proposals or ideas get vetted through you know the administration who then you know answers you know responds to these and then that's something that the board can then um you know discuss or um deliberate as the board as a group sees you know sees fit so um you know I think that um there are several things that um you know that um Kevin can address and tonight and um and over time being that you know this is just landed on us yesterday to give you know him time and um you know other board members time as well so I don't know if you have you know no I think that if that people are comfortable I think just process-wise

076I think you raised a lot of really important points there and so what I'd like to do is um push them into the document and respond in writing and so and I think it's part of that too just even listening to some of your explanation um there's some clarifying we need to do also about some history and where you know which so was the coordinators that replaced the um the curculin leaders at Middlebrook not the coaches and that that was a trade-off at the time when we did that and so there's a whole whole rationale behind it but I think and then let's put the put the numbers to it and make sure that they're they're accurate um so we know exactly what we're talking about as we contemplate all of these different options so

077I'd like to do that I'm sure these guys would all um have some information they'd want to share as well just to give the full history um so I think that's I agree I think that's the best way to go and um we have it now so what we can do is turn it around and I can have it you know by Thursday of next week when we meet um for with it at least even if we don't discuss it at that meeting you'll have it and we can pick it up um in the next two yeah so and I think then you know if you have any further you know clarifying points um you know that need to me to put it all in there as well it's fine yeah that's if that's okay

078with people is a process anybody else have any other like particular I know we we have a lot of information sitting in front of us right now yeah the only the other one that I would add was um Lori had also just raised questions about supplies and so just that so the board's aware um you know we use a vendor that's tied to the state contract so what we're doing now is just we're we're pulling POS and just doing cost analyses and um we'll reach back out to the um the vendor rep and just ask some questions about um price comparisons uh we're also looking at the Amazon business as another area where um if we can shift supplies to a different vendor a different source and pick up some savings and we'll go ahead

079and do that as well so that's all underway can I ask a question about the um the special contracted Services sure and um I'm just I know with the that line item for the ccsn the nearly $700,000 obviously I know that that most of that is tied to IPS I'm sure um no knowing that we have all of this like kind of internal expertise that's that's getting developed around DBT do we see any possibility for those type of um contractual requirements for IEPs potentially getting replaced down the road um that's I defer to Andrea wholly on that we've done I've done a kind of cost analysis the services CSN provides are our board certified behavior analyst and the clinical supervision of the board certified Behavior analysts um so I've done some analysis of the cost

080of hiring in our own people and um those costs would be higher okay um because we don't uh we use them they are part they not here all the time every day um but they do provide provision and they keep a kind of con state of the science of Applied behavioral analysis um across from the prek through 22 um so that's the work they do and the cost of doing it ourselves would be higher all right great thank you you're welcome all right as you're going through the questions um there is an effective Dimension to this work as well especially as we're looking at constraining dollars and um contemplating budget reductions staff reductions so I thought the you know just to address the effective Dimension um there was a question that you know Ruth asked

081about the comprehensive educational program and then a follow on question about um degradation and the environment and you know I think it's important to note Maria has been um engaged in exit surveys with our staff for a while and she shared some data that was really interesting and you know we saw I think we've talked about this once before but in this last year um we you know we had people leaving for very different reasons you know generally speaking when people separate from the district um unless they have amazing jobs with Pepsi um it's generally for retirement right it's where else could there Poss be a better place to work um so like you get the one in a million or you know most people retire but in this last round we had you know

082quite a bit more staff who chose to leave for different reasons you know working conditions they wanted to be close to home and you know as we kind of think back um you know back in the day it was it was okay to you know drive an hour because Wilton had great working conditions and the salaries were better and you know it was just better and you know people were going to be here for the long term and so you know it helped in their the retirement and you know I too soon to call a trend um but we're really curious about the difference um that we've seen you know the pie charts there on the second page um I think Illustrated really carefully really clearly um people are leaving for different reasons and so

083we need to um pay attention to that effective dimension of the quality of work in Wilton whether it's salary and benefits uh demands in the job what have you and so this I thought raise that well and you know again it's it's not dollars and cents in this budget but it's the the care of our staff and that's you know that's we just have to keep an eye on that as where you know we're trying to manage these really challenging fiscal environments if I could ask the kind of like a follow on question to that you provided us with um a listing of um the stiens and their position related to that so I was just wondering if maybe um you or a few building principles can talk about what actually are like the responsibilities

084or the performance the duties that are performed behind some of these you know team leader stien roles or um um you know instructional leader s in roles just so you know thinking about um you know how we manage you know how much we ask people to do and manage work and narrow funding sure yeah I think just as a as a blanket statement there's a a lot of responsibilities that have to be met to make a school run well um Kathy can I put you on the spot do you want to um just talk briefly about what your team leaders do you said Cathy right I did it's a little hard to hear but okay um our team leaders do a lot so the grade level team leaders we take the position and split it

085um so two people take on that position and share it they facilitate the iets so they're responsible for the agendas they're responsible for making sure they have the resources they need um to facilitate those iets and then you know the people who need to be there depending upon what they're doing at the I um they also facilitate the srbi process which is the intervention process so along with us administrators they do that they help us provide um professional learning to the staff so for example this year at the beginning of the school year our entire leadership team which was made up of the instructional leaders by grade level as well as there's a specials uh part-time at our school specials instructional leader they did a lot of professional development for the staff at the beginning

086of the of the year around kids first from day one how to develop your classroom Community um there are Partners when we're planning faculty meetings um they also helped us plan based on the feedback from our staff survey so they helped us plan a lot of the supports um that they thought would be effective with the staff around supporting kids who have behavioral needs or social and emotional needs um you know they're kind of like boots on the ground we meet with them every other week as a leadership team and again they give us feedback on all all kinds of things so and and then they do things like plan you know plan and facilitate field trips they make sure the supply lists are in order so they do some other you know kind of

087logistic kinds of things as well um so it's stands it's a wide variety thank you welcome in the share drive that we created where we put some of your onboarding information uh we put copies of all of the job descriptions for all of typing so you can read them all at your leisure thanks sorry that said one more thing so we also meet over the summer with our leadership team and I know that Dr Falone does the same thing and so they help us with our continuous Improvement planning um as well so we usually have a day or two over the summer that we meet with them as well and that that like summer planning is included in the skyp in and not separate from summertime correct that's included right y that's part of their

088work it's part of the work okay any other uh questions you want to call out or highlight um just just a tactical one if we have follow-up questions to some of these answers what's the best way to just like take the the number line item and paste it back into the email and that yeah or just yeah send it in reference to XYZ and then we'll just continue it as a rolling um yeah as a rolling kind of conversation so to speak I just want to confirm that there is there's no money in the budget for next year for um related to the reading legislation correct beyond the um Grant like pilot yeah we we we received a grant this year to do pilot money um the Chuck do you want to can you just

089confirm that I mean there might be a little bit of professional learning money um but we're not buying we're not there's no half million dollars someplace to buy a program because we're going through the curriculum review process now that's correct um all right so one of the questions that's come up um repeatedly was this question of tradeoffs and so um what you have what I just put in front of you is and I'm going to call it mine because I did this work and I didn't um engage in a collaborative decision-making process yet with my administrative colleagues um if we come to a point in time where we have to revise the budget downward um at that point we'll engage in a stakeholder process to kind of go through and rep prioritize um but I

090wanted to give you a sense of what we're talking about um and we have been saying for years that our budgets are lean and you know we have been fortunate in previous years and even as recently as last year when we've had to make reductions we have been able to blunt the impact by tapping into non-labor sources in our budget and so we had a small gift um not a small gift there's $350,000 that we were able to take out um because of the change we made in healthcare carriers um I so I just I offered that to you um we made a decision a year ago to defer the purchase of laptops for teachers the ones that are on this lease proposal and so uh Eric worked with his team to swap out motherboards

091and Patch them together and you know keep the ones that were in most disrepair functioning um but these things come to the end of the life and you know we're we need to replace them and then I just highlighted two as well when I went back and looked at the list um we have continued to um restrain the lines around library books Around furniture um Fran in one of the questions included you some uh included for you some information about the age of our collections compared to what the expected standards are just to give you a sense of you know a sense of what they what they are so all of that is to say we have a routine practice annually of when we have to make reductions or trying to find efficiencies to start

092with non-labor cost that's also as I was describing earlier kind of underway now um but we're at a point if we have to make a large reduction we don't have large buckets in which to which we can turn um to prevent impact from uh you know Staffing and programs and so I set this up I just want to so you understand what I did here on this piece of paper um first of all I want to be very clear and unequivocal the budget I presented to you is the budget I support so I don't support any reductions to this budget unless we can find them through savings and efficiencies as we've been talking about over the last several weeks um I would not support any reduction um that would impact programming or staff so I

093just want to be perfectly clear and for anybody else who's listening or is going to see this document in no way is this an endorsement or a recommendation by me um when this circulates we are going to have staff that are very nervous um it's going to have an impact and so we just need to understand as we put these conversations out and have them in public the effective piece of the work we're trying to do and help people feel safe and comfortable and secure in their work here that's going to be challenged as we have these conversations and so um I'm going to do this as sensitively as possible and so you know again if I repeat it 50 times I'll repeat it 50 more um I am not targeting any single position I'm

094not targeting any single person um My Philosophy and approach I believe very strongly that we provide a highquality comprehens comprehensive education program and so all of those pieces that are in it including instructional coaching are invaluable to the work we do as the Wilton public schools and so I am not recommending elimination of any single one program anywhere across our district good so far um so understanding all of that my Approach then is how do we work around the edges so we don't have to eliminate any one single program but manage a potential reduction or a reduction last year without completely upending the entire operation okay um and so what you see is a representative list that cuts across just about all departments um you know we try to protect um core classes we try

095to protect instruction but again if we're talking about uh you know I was just thinking about the the Delta between you know what I proposed and um you know the board of Finance guidance rough numbers that's about a million and a half dollars is and so you know if we have to get to that number we've got a lot of considerations that we have to um work through and so um what I offer to you is um just some considerations if we were going to you know go after some dollars we would look at Elementary classroom FTE on this piece of paper what I've um provided for you is just what the impact of class siiz averages would be if we reduced one teacher um per section K5 so you can see you know in

096the across section across grade levels the magnitude is different um but that's there for you looking at Staffing you know we would look at where there's attrition and so this last year um because it was a target of an opportunity not because it was a good idea we um Fran was um stepping back from her position so rather than um hold on to that point4 reassign it we just cut it from the budget that was in response to trying to manage a budget reduction Fran is fully retiring at the end of this year that creates a vacancy I am not suggesting it's a good idea um as you you know heard a minute ago she leads all kinds of the really important Innovative work and so if we have to make reduction that's a real

097sacrifice um you know trying to spread the pain we would look at another administrative position I really don't know where that would be um I would have a lot of concern about taking it out of a building um we don't have extra administrators around and I would just again refer you back to the document I shared with you during the budget presentation that highlights ratios you know I offer that um so you can get a sense of the landscape comparatively we just don't have extra people hanging around but in terms of needing to spread um spread a reduction we'd have to look across all units and that would include the administrative unit um and then thinking you know again within the the teaching staff um can we make a change to a PE schedule someplace

098and reduce a PE teacher we'd have to look at that um should we look at music you know why wouldn't we look at music if we're going to look at PE and we're going to look at classroom instruction so that's an opportunity um the instructional coaching like these other areas um that would be a place where we'd have to look World Language the same um reductions in any of these positions you know it it wouldn't upend the whole program but it is a degradation without question and the impact generally speaking is we are um reducing the number of sections we're increasing class sizes if it's here at the high school we are are potentially locking kids out of opportunities because we're not running certain courses so all of those um are potential detrimental impacts um

099the uh stiping question came up um we pay um quite a lot of money when you aggregate all the stiens so it's a you know it's a total budget line of just over $800,000 um so we'd have to look at that so if we cut the stien line in half that's $400,000 but that's also work that's not getting done folded within that is clubs and activities which we've heard a lot of feedback about especially here at the high school so we'd have to talk about the impact there and you know how we might massage that if if we're able to um in addition to people's uh regularly uh regular work schedules we provide um funds for additional time if we have to bring people in um to do some work um over the summer um

100often times that is you know for for teachers and other staff curriculum writing and curriculum development for some of our clerical staff all of those um clerical responsibilities uh transitioning records moving files um being available um to cover the office as people are coming and going in the summertime we have um 10-month people that um wouldn't normally be scheduled to work but we provide some additional dollars so they can fulfill some of those tasks in the summertime when kids aren't in the building so we'd have to look at that line um overtime is another area you know we U provide overtime primarily to our custodians um generally speaking those overtime dollars are um spent uh when we bring custodians in um a few of the weekends before we open school and so they get paid

101you know time and a half on Saturdays um just to make sure the building's ready they're also here when we have weather emergencies so they're on call um as the weather's coming in to do snow removal and sidewalk clearing and things like that and then um we have overtime for when we have building um emergencies so we spent quite a bit in overtime this last fall when we were responding to the um mold concerns at Miller Drisco at um Middlebrook and Cider Mill and then um we also um provide overtime when we're Staffing the building on Saturday so some of that is an assumed cost because they're here opening the building for our Athletics teams in other cases we have facility rentals and they pay a fee and it offsets the overtime cost that we

102charge um to have the building available for those other um organizations um and then you know we I just to make sure we're looking at a comprehensive picture um we ought to look at the Athletics program too so I included for you if we were to eliminate all freshman Sports you know it's not a big dollar it's $70,000 um but the impact is enormous and so um last year year we had over 200 student athletes participate in freshman programs so the loss of that would be um you know from a kids perspective incalculable um I looked at what would be the cost if we eliminated one away game from all of the subv varsity team so freshman JV primarily not a big dollar amount it's $8,200 so but if we're trying to get to a

103certain point or we need to get to a certain point that might be something we need to consider um would recommend reducing games at the on the varsity schedule uh because as soon as we short ourselves games we jeopardize our um eligibility for the state tournaments um so that's a very unsavory list and you know I sit here as superintendent of schools and think you know my first responsibility is to provide to the people and the children in this community the best quality education we can um and none of those things serve that goal um so it's hard to even talk about but that's the landscape um I kind of skipped over the first three uh first two boxes there but just to give you a full perspective um if we were going to add

104back to the budget um some of the things that I would include to the existing bottom line and you can just see the list there so I think Fran's position is enormously important and so I would seek to restore that because of how critical it is to our you know kind of forward-looking mission um you heard some very compelling testimony about the power of DPT skills training and so the opportunity to expand that through a stiens um Andrea has talked in the last two years about the need for a differentiated program aside a mill but the Staffing to do that's expensive um so that's on the list you heard Kathy describe um the importance of stem instruction and what she'd like to do with an additional stem teacher um and then the added benefit there

105of creating additional planning time for our staff at Miller Driscoll so that's on the list um that High School administration talked about their challenges um managing student behavior and responding to all of the other concerns and responsibilities they have so they've had a unmet request for a couple of years to have an additional um administrative support and then two you heard um the challenge with managing kindergarten or so having an additional parah to help provide additional adult support in those kindergarten classes would be on my list um and then the remaining three are non-personnel um Furniture we have starved the furniture replacement budget for all the years I've been here um supplies you know we are managing with supplies but um you know we also have some teachers going out to Teachers Pay Teachers and

106you know doing other things to try to get supplies so that would be to adequately you know make sure the supply budgets are where they need to be and then the the last piece is professional learning and and um again when we've had to make choices um often times we have sacrificed professional learning opportunities and so um if given the opportunity to restore those would be the areas that I would um choose to focus on you know this happens at my house too I talk and people are silent I'm like I don't even think they're listen these are my CH I don't even think they're listening oh we so anyway I know I know you're drinking it get yeah so you know I think I Echo Kevin's um sentiments about the sensitivity of the discussion

107and um couple that with also the reality of what's in front of us um I think that um I appreciate your forthrightness about the budget that you presented and how you feel about it and where we are um and that it does um reflect the um Collective expertise and priorities of you and and your staff um and I look forward to you know Finding hopefully those um non-labor savings that we were um talking about y yeah um and um you know continuing to have um the discussion I don't know if anybody has any um you know direct direct questions right now it's a lot no I do have uh just one correction I realized as I look at it the the items that I had at 17150 those are the department heads I didn't mean

108to okay so I can send an email the I you're talking about okay that all right now I understand that's yeah no worries it's a lot of number right there's a lot here lot of numbers and it was like 10:00 probably was a bad idea but yeah and just you know not to belabor that point but when we were setting up you know so one of the challenges um early on in my tenure is we had um a lot of siloed care curriculum and particularly across the K8 span and so one of the opportunities where we pursued was um creating two curriculum coordinator positions and so you guys have spent actually new board members haven't but old board members have so we have Karen breni who functions as the K8 curriculum coordinator um Trudy Denton

109as the um k12 and she was K8 for a bunch of years but as we were trying to Grapple with some of the issues around um algebra in the high school we extended those so she works handing glove with the two ILS um but there was a um the instructional leader um setup at the high school was strong and was in place and we weren't intending for the curriculum coordinators to span up to K12 so that's why we left those positions the way they are um and really privileged and you know we were also privileging um you know first reading and math and then you know into the full Humanity social studies and science uh so that's that's the reason why we made the change the way we did and then they their work was

110is supported by the kadra of instructional coaches that are employed in the district yeah and I and I think this all kind of circles back to this idea of you know the comprehensive education that you know Wilton strives um to provide and the you know the opportunities and the achievement of um expectations of our students and our families and even the community um at large I mean our schools are a big part of what brings people here and what maintains our property values as well so I think all the um you know there's a lot of moving pieces particularly um this year um but I think that it's um you know over the years we've all always talked about running lean budgets and our lower percentages and degradation over time and it's always hard to

111to show it because we do have amazing staff and we have an amazing team here um but I think that this year and this list and the choices are are driving that home in a in a different way and so um I just want everybody to know that we are you know being thoughtful and um being diligent and um really kind of working hard for you know the schools and our town to try to um do the right thing do the right thing yeah yeah in the in the time you've been here I was trying to remember all of the kind of the big changes you made from in the beginning you kind of reorganized um par of professionals um and how they were allotted to staff and the cost avoidance with Genesis and Community

112steps um the renegotiating the health insurance plan and last year's Middlebrook um schedule changed what it allowed us to do um for many years you've man we've managed budget increases by like really thinking strategically and and making some great savings and I think it was clear to me that we were going to run out rabbits or hats at some point um and this is the year there's no more rabbits than the Hat um and it's unfortunate very we're looking at such a tough budget season I think it would be helpful yeah seemly this comes up every year the first area big area people look at as the coaches I think it would be helpful to hear I know you have the principles on the phone like to hear not in writing but like hear from

113them what is the impact that the coaches are having are they doing different things in different schools I think a lot of people don't understand everything the coaches are doing um so whether it's tonight if that's appropriate thing to ask or not but to to hear firsthand from you know boots on the grounds um and again article on the paper there's a lot of talk about and I think it we would all benefit from this really understanding sure I think just as an initial starting point because this is a conversation that's been recurring over years um there are um several presentations um there was one as recently as was last year or the year before that um where we had some instructional coaches here they present it to the board um so I think why

114don't I just I'll gather that material as a beginning Point since it's already exist and part of our record um invite you all to to look at it and then we can um you know I'll work with you know Chuck and team to just supplement that with some more more recent um experiences Ian I do you know there's no um you know choice that I they're all difficult they're all difficult thank you um they're all difficult and um I do though you know sit back and do like reflect Over You Know My Last 5 Years on on the board and just um being involved in these budget discussions and do taking it that for every year that I've been here where we've had this coaching discussion and other discussions you know the budget and that

115the administration puts out as that recommendation that is their priority that is the trade-offs that they've already made and the discussions that they've already had and um and the that that is their um you know shared kind of knowledge about how they think we can continue to drive and the system the way we've all known to grow and expect so um and I think that that's also where some of these decisions even become more challenged or difficult so I know that we have our um next meeting on the 8th it's a joint meeting with the board of Finance I'm hoping Board of finance will be submitting their questions in um shortly so um you and your staff have time to [Laughter] um to dig in um I'm looking forward to you know a productive and

116um productive meeting um on the 8th um there will be um public comment after that meeting our next meeting scheduled is a special meeting on February 29th we have a lot and I am going to hold open the possibility of us um meeting again um the week of the I guess the 12th that that week whether it's um the the 13th 14th 15th one of those um um days if we um think that it's you know would be help beneficial and necessary for us as a board and um I'm not going to try to ruin anybody's Valentine's Day although if you want it ruined you can you know text me later and let me know I would have to zoom in okay that's yeah um that's more than not that I I'm going to be

117date and doing I am going to be in Wisconsin no that's yeah that would just be awkward yeah both might be awkward um but so I'm thinking that that's going to be something that we're um that we should all anticipate um moving forward and and again you know um we do you know please people out there you know watching um questions concerns ideas as um you know we Boe at Wilton ps.org or come to a meeting and um give a comment in person if you're so inclined are there any other questions or um comments we want to be proud of our system we want to be proud of our kids and we have to be thoughtful about how we do that this is a thought this is a good budget you address things that we

118just kind of kicked down the road that had to be we had to do it I think it's one of those come up years where we just have to pay the Vier for the things that we haven't done in a couple of years and I think it takes courage to do that and it takes you know we have to talk to the town and to the people that understand that we've kicked too many things down the road and we we cut and cut and cut and there's a point where if we cut too much more we're on a bone and then not really a school that offers a broad breath of learning that we want our kids to have and and some of the losses are big losses if we do that so I think

119we have to be careful that we that we think carefully about presenting a budget that we know is going to just not be a fun budget to beete with and to live with and that's not going to be particularly helpful to our kids and I think we have to be careful about that your Point's well taken but this is like the perfect storm so I do think we need to do our due diligence and look at everything that's on the table and make a thoughtful decision as you as you mentioned CU a lot of this isn't stuff it's people you know and people make schools and hum need we need good people I'm going to close with that final thought um we do have a um another item to discuss and approve the technology equipment

120lease proposal Boe goal number 11 great while Eric's coming up to the table I'm just going to take a moment since Matt and Rudy are both here tonight um there's such a refreshing change in tone in our engagement with the board of finance and so M I'm just going to say thank you again thank you you know in a different audience a week or so ago but you know for the good of the order here and for anyone that's home watching you are um constructively proactively communicative um you're open you're transparent Rudy has been present um at our workshops and at our meetings more than I think any other board of Finance meet met you too so um the what that signals to me is just the the roll up your sleeves willingness to engage

121and um you know I think it's important for the town to understand that the all three elected boards are in this together and so I didn't want to miss the opportunity just to name that while you're in the room at the yes and so we had been at all the PTA he's making his rounds no I had the PTA president's meeting and they were also um very appreciative of your presence your cander your willingness to listen uh and they're looking for forward to more of that so um so keep up the good work so the last item here uh we had talked about this so these are the details uh just as a bit of background um there were a number of years where we leased equipment um and the we would propose a lease

122uh we would give it to the um CFO who would go out and find leasing terms and then bring that to the board of Selectmen they're charged with approving leases um and so in recent years uh there was a change made from leasing to um purchasing straight up with all cash um if you go and look at some recent budget lines um as one of the consequences of doing that is we you know kind of reduce our purchasing power because we're paying all cash um and so we deferred some purchases um new opportunity with a new Administration to revisit this practice um I spoke with both Tony and Matt some time ago um and they seem to be in favor of leasing as a structure assuming that we can get good lease terms you know

123one of the the concerns that had come up um in previous years was we had leased Chromebooks and so there was just a just a question about you know do the do the Chromebooks last the life life of the lease um and we you know while Chromebooks are generally in service with kids for three years we do keep them for five because we use them as spares and you know for parts and things like that um but just even recognizing um the question about Chromebooks um you'll knowe Chromebooks are not included in the leasing proposal so there's still in our um budget um cash set aside to purchase the replacement Chromebooks that we need um and so what you have here is a list of other equipment um and I would just you know call

124your attention to the middle of the page if you look at life cycle um they're all five years or greater in terms of the um in terms of the lifespan so the laptops that we deferred a year ago we need to purchase so we're looking at 125 you know that's a total cost of 140,000 um we use docking stations in the classroom and so just if you kind of go back to a few years um all of the classrooms had desktop computers um many of the classrooms still today um have projectors and Smartboard screens um and then we issued laptops to um teachers so that was a lot of technology for one instructional space so one of the changes that we've made you know under Eric's guidance here is we um issued all of the

125teachers laptops we removed all of the desktops and then we installed um docking stations and so you know we cut I don't know you know hundreds of thousands of dollars out of our replacement cost over time because we're no longer relying on desktops now the Next Generation for us um is the these kind of flat panel TVs like you have you know behind you here um these are less expensive than a full Smartboard projector unit so our smartboards are coming to the end of the life across the district so we need a replacement plan we're replacing them with better um more efficient more costeffective equipment um and those last we're expecting about 10 years um we also we have sound fields in the overwhelming majority of our classes these are um audio devices um there

126are many amplifiers that teachers use right they make an incredible impact make an incredible impact in the classroom uh there's plenty of research to support their efficacy in promoting student learning um so we need to begin replacing those so we're looking to purchase um 15 of those um everything is digital and we have servers and we just need we need to replace our servers and so we're in a replacement process so um there's a couple of servers we need uh and then at the uh Miller jiso uh we use iPads and so those are at the end of their lives so we're looking to um replace iPads at Miller Driscoll and then um some other UPS battery backup um again this is infrastructure we already have but it's end of life and then a firewall

127um we already have it it's end of life um so that all combined um leads us to a request of 1,097 if you total straight down the line it's actually more than that um but this request assumes um $350,000 in the operating budget um part of that 256 375 will address the Chromebooks and then um the rest of it is just the difference between the um what we're recommending for the lease and the total amount of um all of that equipment which is about $93,000 um Eric is there anything you would add the only thing I I would add is that we we do have the opportunity perhaps for some grant funding um and if that comes through we might be able to bring a lease request down but if this time you know we're

128moving forward with with the entire so when will we know that we'll know that by March 27th great so then the um the motion can be and the request of the select could be you know um a lease of up to you know the amount and then you know just if we can revise it down we'll revise it down is that um is leasing done by the company we buy from no no it's Bank lease it's new bank and to the equipment cost this got to bid yes so there's a policy that any spend over is it 25,000 25,000 has to go out to bid yeah we bid more stuff unless it's small and then you know we also um because we're a public school system um you know we get the most competitive rates

129through State contracts and so often um we can rely on the state contract and then circumvent a formal RFP process because we already have a mechanism to get the most costeffective equipment any other questions um is there a motion to approve a request to the board of Selectmen to approve a 5-year lease up to the amount of $1,971 38 to support the purchase of tech technology equipment thank you Pat is there a second Thank you Pam all in favor any oppose no extensions motion carries unanimously and um moving on to um future business and information items once again we'll be meeting on next Thursday um that'll be in the zelner I believe zelner in the zelner um at 7:00 with the board of finance and even though it's a special meeting public comment at the

130conclusion of the meeting thank you you're welcome um then um there our next um scheduled meeting is for February 29th which includes the budget votes and then there will be a regular meeting on March um 7th and on the 20th of March will be the Board of Education public hearing um to the board of finance and the town on our budget are there comments from the public hearing none and seeing none um 94 meeting ised all right go I'm gonna run out of here everybody enjoy don't be in touch