001is there a motion to approve the agenda thank you second thank you Jen all in favor um in their comments from the public anybody from the public would like to say a word being done all in favor absolutely so we're going to start with our student s Maria has been steadily building our digital video production program here at the high school for a number of years and she's really good at her job and our kids are supremely talented and so can they come home with thumb boards so um welcome I wanted to hear it off and then I'll try to teach this thing up so um [Applause] this year our students participated we don't know where we played right now we find out next week for the award ceremony and that's where they'll announce your
002first second or third for both competition petition what is it more of a connect both promoting safe driving so we start in the summer these students here have traveled to car shows basketball games they've been on the radio at 92 to promote safe driving habits for teens and tell everyone not to be a distracted driver Ethan Bailey who's PSA you saw at the last Board of Ed meeting is also part of the campaign he's made the PSA which is the main portion of our video every year in order to show the work they've done they have to put together a three-minute video for the judges panel only sees a three minute video and it has to capture them and convince them that we've done a great job promoting safe driving so this is a three
003minute video that was aired it was actually shown nationally we had showed it as a Lifesavers conference to police officers Fire Marshals and a whole lot of other crew members there so I'll show that to you the whole time I had children classes your kids are different who they are and their personalities maturity all of that things foreign [Music] my dad was driving me in here and when I was going on vacation and they paid attention and that's the thing that then sparked our ideas and was number one influencers in our lives in today's lives actually are parents so this is my third year being involved with our safe driving campaign Entre me I thought they were really important because as a high schooler there's a lot of new and experienced drivers and I know
004how dangerous I can be when people don't take it seriously so I find it informed to promote our messages driving and this year when we come to realize is how much of an impact parents can have on new inexperienced drivers we started the Europe without a representative from an impactique drivers whether they educated in the dangers of destructive driving sharing stories from families of those who died showing us the will of that the percentages of different factors that impact users has become a community-wide involvement people run together to raise awareness about being a safe driver I remember one activity we did in Mrs police's class where we collected data on all the charts Drive they buy and if they were distracted what we noticed was that people would stop at the light he'd fix hair
005and drink coffee it just made us realize how many agnostic it is okay and we wanted to change that one of my favorite things we did was the driving schools which was an amazing experience sitting on a virtual reality set there's like I was the one on the road and then driving and texting it was difficult to try maybe think about what it was like to actually do that all over not that I want to scare people but it is scary to know how we have to change our mindsets and be safe drivers there's a reason for the saying eyes on the road Hands on the Wheel mind on the drive it's my last year before I graduated high school for the last few years my mission has been to change the mindset of distracting
006driving is okay on all the adults out there to know that starts with you being the driver you want your child that entire video was produced scripted planned out how the students even the footage they collected it over the year they had over four to five hours of footage and then they had to make it in two minutes and 59 seconds so it was a lot of work and it was because of them and we're really excited look forward to next week to see where we place and hopefully bring home some money [Applause] [Music] [Applause] I get there but I wanted to First recognize Maria and the kids for all of this incredible work that they've been doing Maria has actually built this program in a way that I haven't seen that program still before
007in the past five or six years have brought in so many students we have new courses starting next year and the students are extremely talented folks we have a wonderful video instructors we have great video programs I have the privilege of actually representing Wilton at the area 9 cable cable tease cable advisory we're serving the board with others from the area districts and every year we run a access awareness Awards campaign where we invite students to participate given their entry and um in a variety of categories so you know as Maria was saying because of PSA it's got to be no more than three minutes long it's got a title slide we have to Source the music all of those things have to be including the video that they've ever been audio quality so um
008I know that Dr Smith has shared this with you but I want to actually reiteria that bulletin actually place um in the top three of the awards for the last axis Awards um competition for 11 of our s 11 Awards is what we so that is amazing that included actually sweeping um the stop motion at the elementary level um thanks to our Cider Mill folks getting an award at Willow Driscoll for I don't know like how many years in the running for for the program and um having like so many different wonderful Productions so thank you thank you to the students for all of that thank you great so next up is uh some recognition for our retirees this is always Bittersweet for those of us who get to stay because these are you know
009personalities who've kind of you know taken up shop in our hearts and occupy our lives and so next year will not be the same but why don't we start with the high school and we'll just kind of work in reverse order so Dr O'Donnell will present our retirees from Wilton height Santa around the club [Music] [Applause] he is ensured that all of our facilities are an excellent running order as the leader of the district agreement recently Matt has demonstrated his leadership ability as plant manager at our very own wealth in high school where he doesn't apply his expertise in HVAC mechanical and pumping systems among others always sought to support our staff so that they could be in a position to excel in their most important charge which of course is educating our outstanding students
010and that is beloved among the staff and received the standing motivation recently at the academic awards ceremony for the skills his humility and his caring approach to his craft Madness retiring we miss him already and he hasn't even left he intends to spend time with his family that's like roses here and roosevelty you're up to Maine and in his honor we have this book hitting hidden systems water electricity the internet systems we use every day to be ignored and Wilson High School library learning class and Matt we love you thank you thank you everybody [Music] [Applause] else this evening it's ironic that was was the trajectory of so many people two years was a little family care over her retirement she could could possibly come up with an excuse for not being here but she
011doesn't have an excuse she's got a busy thing which we need them to do today but I'd be surprised if she's so humble that she probably would considered but uh for the last decade of our freshman in English classes and nearly every other always wanted to make a personal personal balance that we find purpose that meaning and what they do and to especially explore intellectual aspects for all these impact we've felt for years among our books for her bold and expanding worldly understanding of our students while preparing them for life beyond the town is it in value for students for leadership to improve diversity equity and inclusion in our schools is so valuable and her career began in the corporate world and prior to joining Wilton High School over a decade ago she taught us
012here by Danbury High School so far two decades she's been Mrs Rodney and the devoted white and mother and she plans to enjoy spending time with her children and grandchildren so we do have a quote to dedicate to our LLC in honor of Mrs Ronnie's River Spirit Layla Abdullah and uh thank you Lucy has been teaching since 1981. the he started at Wilson High School as a science teacher in 1989. Germany is behind a legacy is one of the greatest and most dedicated colleagues he makes it his mission to support every student that enters his nurses can also to support all of his colleagues as the long-standing science instructional leader he's been a model instructional leader and won movie frequently going to for other instructional leaders to emulate Jim's colleagues across the school described him
013simply as a legend Jim has pursued a K-12 NASA fast plan project a trout rearing study flounder monitoring the Long Island Sound River study program Cider Mill a sabbatical the studying chemistry further at UMass Amherst just to name a few Jim has a unique ability to win the hearts and minds of all of his students and brings out the best in his letter announcing his retirement Jim share of this sentiment Wilton encouraged me to practice science but most importantly so that's not my level of science to my student is the place you come through a career and I challenging and rewarding career Jim is a dedicated husband and father Amy is here one of our local public schools employees of course his retirement plans include dogs sitting remarkably good morning his daughter's dance school Irish
014Dance School swimming in his new pool when we invited over and when his wife needs the company out of travel to go to go to England and Jim will miss your wisdom you're with immensely you are such an influential figure in our school and then [Applause] generation of Charleston Linden Johnson Richard Nixon and the great environmental Awakening [Applause] as we're leaving and how sometimes your brain and engages in your mouth just goes and your greatest hits in an arid environment and my friend just looks ahead I've never had an opportunity degrees thank you thank you [Applause] foreign teacher throughout their time in Wilton to celebrate tomorrow Ceramics of education and other parallel advice he's met your teacher and surround system for assess all students current level those skills the skillfully guided for students while presenting
015multiple Pathways for them to exercise their own creativity in their pieces student work under Michelle's guidance is a memory including Scholastics and even national award winners including recent trips to Carnegie Hall for national student Michelle Currier is retired early from her career including below her beloved daughter Barry and the book that will be donating to the LLC is a particles very nice [Applause] Joe you're up so I'll just acknowledge Robin Johnson is not able to be here tonight I did want to just give the very reasonable reason for why she's not here that is because she's watching her son Chris play and tonight so good reason not to be here right it's okay Okay so Kendra Norman joined with Milton public schools in 1985 and I'll do the math 38 years ago [Applause] itself because
016she still has the heart uh Kendra retires at as the Middleburg science teacher to instrumental in supporting staff as an instructional leader for Science and also as a team leader for years and years dedication and love she has for her well over 4 000 students taught inspired she would regularly take home science appointments for example the science aprons to repair them so that students would be able to use them the next day or the next year you're right in fact we're a little worried about things in the classroom our senior she connects wonderfully with students supporting their every need and establishing the environment that promotes care I understand I also have not known someone to love the color purple more than category or I could pull it off if she does Kendra doesn't know or
017hasn't has any set plans for retirement a joke when there is she should become a starter Golf Course and I just think that's perfect because then she gets to travel around on her very own golf cart Alexander of the important thank you Kendra thank you for the years and years of making science fun and interesting truly be missed As you move on [Applause] so tell them tell them my mom oh um I started my career in 1977 as a physical volunteer in Ghana so I thought I taught biology and physical science [Applause] in advance and joined the public schools in 1996 as a school counselor at Millbrook School during her 2017 year containment she's enjoyed giving students in grades six seven and eight throughout the years some of the greatest development student new and nervous
018sixth graders and counsels them through their eighth grade and then through their transition most who actually would certainly that explained 27 years of this labor of love means she's completed that cycle of grades six seven and eight over nine times guiding roughly about 9 000 students I approximated 102 actually had a team with over 300 to 350 so and joke with me that uh she and I have worked alongside each other for about 25 years and we still talk to each other and we still like each other she knows I love her and we'll miss her and doesn't have any set plans yet just yet anyway for retirement her husband died or I guess seven years so Anne's looking forward to the opportunity for a midweek ski trip here and there or maybe an early
019October run up to the cave just because they can uh knowing Anne and her love and of connections with people should probably find herself volunteer and tutor kids in the inner city or wind up working at a dog shelter the idea of having a life not controlled by an alarm clock or having to make sure she's on the highway before traffic begins sounds fairly effective the book selected for Anne that's going to be in our library honoring her is called Loyal by Rebecca Ashley Brooks but thank you and all you've done for the for this [Applause] yes thank you very much um you know when I was asked to pick the book at it well I think that you know mental health as well with counseling and um just when you talk about dogs and
020kids that's huge again so I thought it was so appropriate to choose something very basic and you know have every choice so um [Music] [Applause] thank you he is literally the hardest she's dedicated so many hours [Music] she's been my robot since I began 10 years ago and it's been part of the Cyber possible community oh um if you have a question she knows it I have some of our ETA in the past current members here we've lost without our friends here to answer all of our questions and if she can't figure it out she knows where to go from here kind of source code she knows what I mean when it comes to treasure the wisdom and her friendship she will just email us [Applause] [Music] thank you [Applause] anyway there's one more yeah
021the buses may not run online for the challenging process ING with our outside Transportation providers responding to parent requests and increase combining and reassigning muscles what is she will know better Grant has been here in fair weather and have gotten up at 4 am in call the police department to more challenges present themselves brand needs them with Grace flexibility back organizations her appreciation for listening her commitment to doing what's best for both though she has worn many paths in her various roles for that the book that has been selected for you and for anyone who knows me and so plenty four is that beautiful photograph s and anyone um we will miss you um [Applause] [Music] thank you foreign [Music] [Applause] so in this room tonight we also have a room full of volunteers that
022make magic happen for our schools in ways beyond the classroom so we just want to take a minute to say all of you from the ptas to Sports boosters the little new Council and web and um the many things and contributions that you bring to our students our staff and our parents and our community and I would like to just take a look thank you for all of you for all that you do yeah please stand so the rest of us can acknowledge you around [Music] [Applause] now the only piece I would ask that is if you go into the research on quality communities in the high quality school systems right at the top of the list is a parent teacher parent School partnership and this community is emblematic of high quality if you need
023objective evidence you can look at any of the programs so in athletics we had a ski a state championship can see this winter right for girls our football team went further than they've gone in 25 years our boys lacrosse team are the FCI Champions first time in 24 years just three hours ago our boys Tennessee won the state championship our girls are on the field right now on their way to another state championship so Athletics is rolling and that's in large parts of our parents our music program has every adjudication they come home with a Bus full of awards our theater program was nominated for 11 Halo no 22 HALO Awards sorry 111 right they won they won 11. they won four but they won the I'll name them before they're in my notes in
024a little bit like the three of the four top Awards was in high school came home and I was told the inside baseball was they wanted to the Halo people wanted to um kind of recognize both the this fall play and the musical but you know whenever State politics you can only do one so short story is our kids are amazing and you know again our parent volunteers are right behind us so in every corner of this community and every corner of the district you've got parents and professionals working alongside each other in service to our kids and how wonderful is that and how great are they so from my heart thank you all and thank you again tonight and we're getting right through this year so please have some excuse we got just a
025couple more things to do yeah right yeah so thank you um all right next on the agenda I just guess it's the parents the community volunteers everybody you know my fellow board members everybody who had their time and there's love and their passion tools to make our kids thrive on a daily basis really when I look at this night and then I think you know the graduation that's coming up in a couple of weeks just makes me so proud to be a part of this this community so that's my chair report for the evening I don't know if you have I'm just going to fill in a few details best contemporary musical Mary Poppins best leading actress in a musical Ella DeLuca best supporting actor in a musical Henry Purcell best run crew the player
026that goes wrong so amazing we kind of walked through the sports things so last night we had right a first inaugural event at Cider Mill that was amazing the place was packed the school was beautiful with student artwork you want to take a minute and just describe for the folks who no longer have third fourth or fifth graders what went on down there after England really celebrate their own cultures with each other and now it's just kind of amazing and it was just a standout person but it exceeded our expectations yeah congratulations terrific yep that's it for the superintendent report because I don't believe any of the Committees have anything to do um but we do add two items for review and discussed before we do that um you're all welcome to say for the
027remainder of the meeting I know some of you have kids at home that time if you need to leave feel free to do so um Lucille has also a place to go containers if anybody wants to bring us back home or get ahead of making lunch for tomorrow so feel free to do that great yeah all right so we have Emily and Dolores are here time to present the continuing ed report so you want to just let it rip um yeah yeah go ahead okay we'll see we'll sit too yeah let's speak to the room right so such a difference attendance and support together Emily dabbing and I will briefly discuss our progress through the various units of continuing education and we're going to begin with child care right so registration big exciting news is
028that for child care programs for next year they opened on May 17th registration and the after school programs filled within 10 minutes that's amazing so they are filled for next year for this year we increased enrollment 12 in the Miller Driscoll after school program we increased 18 in The Cider Mill after school program drop-ins increased by 10 overall and we're trending lower in the before school program due to parents continuing to work from home I believe a highlight to the Miller Driscoll Child Care Program is we have expanded the raised bed gardening program there and we have about 40 participants you know 40 of our kids are in that program we plant we you know grow we Harvest and we're growing lettuces and kales and nasturtiums and marigolds and they're having a great time doing
029that so on to enrichment for our young students Sports and stem programs that attract the greatest participation to that end we've added additional sports activities and further developed stem programs and fine and Performing Arts we offered 10 new programs this year for sports map all and PE games at Cider Mill was a huge success baseball Miller Driscoll martial arts both schools Miller Driscoll Cider Mill and we doubled the registrations in sports and games with Mr jimo and Mr Schultz uh new for stem we have new and expanded programs including imagination Engineering in the new Cider Mill maker space 45 kids in that program and 3D design and printing they had a great time they made their own avatars they made name plaques they had keychains and we also doubled the registration in coding using scratch
030new and performing arts classes nature art Workshop group guitar and contemporary dance we also continue to partner with Wilton Public Schools teachers for new programs and overall we increased registrations 18 for fall and 23 percent for winter this summer we're a capacity for Camp invention it's back for the eighth year in a row and it's running again for two weeks and it's filled both weeks with 120 students in each week be a good sport with Mr jimo is running for seven weeks and we have a strong enrollment in that program as well at Miller Driscoll for music popular instruments include piano and drums I just want to note on the enrichment side this year we're trending with uh the top capacity in stem and sports last year it was chess and Tennis so you know
031we're trending a little differently this year geared more to the Sciences I'd like to talk about adult education for adult education one of the primary program considerations is the social component that you can see in some of our programs like pickleball and outdoor gardening and group pottery and group knitting and those programs especially pickleball attracted the most participants and so um well to capitalize on that observation which we've always observed that social component is very important but over the last two years we've seen it even more so coming out of covid so to capitalize on that observation we restored the bridge classes in the Mahjong classes we expanded pickleball from one day a week to three days a week an initial participation of 18 students a few years ago and now we have well over
032a hundred students in pickle pickleball so if you haven't played you have to become a Pickler go to the website we've expanded knitting we doubled the registration by offering it instead of one evening a week to three evening weeks three evenings a week we expanded Pottery to include Kids pottery programs on the wheel and we've doubled registrations in pottery and expanded the gardening class one note I would like to say is our tennis program well it took a hit this year we lost two Tennis Pros and we are revamping that program anybody a tennis probably here still very tough to hire now traditionally we like to end with the top five adult education programs and I know you love to hear this and the number five program this year was Pottery the number four group
033knitting number three where's Lucille charcuterie okay we had a huge enrollment in charcuterie we offered that right before Thanksgiving it was a hit the number two program beekeeping and we offered a great program with the Wilton Library we partnered with them and the number one program this year pickleball thank you so much yes yes just before you go so for for members of the board I mean continuing ed with these two women has always been a like tremendous success in reaching hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of people really took a hit through covid for very obvious reasons but Emily and Dolores have been working morning noon and night and I don't know you've got your finger on the pulse of the community they're so flexible and adaptive they're constantly generating new programs trying to see
034what's going to stick what's going to fade and so I love talking to them I talked to Dolores more I see Emily like on the way out of the parking lot but she's always you always know what's going on and it's like we've got a program for that we've got a program for that so thank you it's much appreciated thank you [Applause] next up we have Fran and School links yeah join us [Music] all right thank you for giving me this opportunity I'm very excited to introduce you to a new platform called School links which is a comprehensive platform that will replace Naviance as our college career Readiness platform School links offers a wide range of features that is going to enhance Student Success support College and Career Readiness and Foster very strong School parent
035support it will provide an easier way for our staff to schedule coordinate and ensure students have access to college visits events and information unlike what we've had with Naviance this is actually going to be available to students beginning in grade six so we'll start in Middlebrook and available of course through our seniors in addition to providing all the features it will serve as a repository for our middle schools to create their Student Success plans helping to facilitate that process as well before I start with some of the highlights I wanted to just note one important caveat that we are going to have a soft implementation right and what I mean by that is because of the fact that we have Juniors that have already begun the process and have some information already in Naviance and
036have begun that whole process we will continue having Naviance for seniors next year so that they can complete that um but this actually will be rolled out uh beginning on August 1st for students in 6th through 11th grade just some of the highlights it's got a great database with extensive information on colleges universities career options it's got ways of empowering students to make informed decisions there are links to actual um uh people that are leaders in the fields that they may be interested in there are ways that students can actually connect with them so there's a really rich resource there are aptitude assessments online assessments that start with an interest inventory virtual College fairs that are actually part of this one of the things our counselors really like a lot is the event scheduler because
037there's so much coordinating with the events of the the Reps coming in ETC and all of that information that comes out during the the course of the year that students are pairing that there's a schedule that allows not only for the scheduling the coordinating the connecting and partnership with all of the college reps but also a way to register and to put it all in one calendar that can actually be synced with their Google Calendar so that's going to be wonderful there's transcript management making that easier teacher recommendation there's a scope and sequence for counselors that they can go through particular lessons and we're really excited I know I've got the high school folks here with Brian Keating excited about the new program of study there's an there's an interactive course planner that's within the
038platform that we'll be able to use for our program of study as we begin in doing that work and integrating it there are some additional features that we will look into in the future that are part of the program there's a work based learning aspect to it and internship tracking Resume Builder so it sounds like as you probably know it's a robust platform that we're going to softly Implement and make available so that parents have a wonderful place to go in as a parent portal to keep track of following that entire process like I said it will be available as of August 1st to all family students teachers our counselors of course already in it they've received three training sessions and we'll be sending out communication to parents regarding this in July and again repeating
039it in August and the beginning of the school year so that nobody misses out on it [Applause] with nothing under possible action items Just for future business and information items there is an anticipated executive session with a special meeting on Thursday the 8th at 1 15 and then we will break for summer and we will be back on August 24th right before the start of the school year so um I would just like to wish everybody a happy healthy restful restorative break and are there any comments from the public hearing none we can adjourn the meeting and I don't have the time 7 44. 7 okay