HBOE - Regular Meeting - 8/19/2025-ORG

001[Music] Gracias. Good evening. As chairperson of the Hartford Board of Education, I hereby call to order the August 19th, 2025 regular meeting. I wish to extend a warm welcome to everyone present and to our television viewers. The board superintendent and I are pleased that you have joined us as we celebrate achievement, review information, and make policy decisions related to the effective operations of Hartford Public Schools. This is a regular meeting and all items that will be discussed or voted on this evening have been posted as required by law. As the Hartford Board of Education, we are here to set goals, listen to the reports of the superintendent, approve budgets, contracts, and personnel appointments, and make policy for the district. We are not here to make management decisions or solve the problems of individuals. Management is

002the responsibility of the superintendent. The monthly meetings of the board are open to the public. They are the time when the board conducts its business of governing the school system in a public arena. The regular meetings are not meetings with the public. Therefore, comments from the audience will be confined to the time designated for the public to address the board. Decorum and courtesy are important elements in effective public meetings. Please silence your cell phones or communication devices and refrain from talking while others are speaking. Since it is legally mandated that proceedings be accurately recorded, I may have to ask for order periodically should noise begin to interfere with our recording capabilities. I am pleased that you have taken time to join us this evening. We are very proud of the school system and thank you

003for your interest in Hartford Public Schools. This will now be read in Spanish. Harford. Foreend superintendent. for Harford. Thank you. We will now move on to public comment. Mr. Mills. We as a board in collaboration with the superintendent and district leadership are committed to cultivating a culture of excellence at all levels of HPS. We thank you for taking the time to attend tonight's board meeting. We appreciate you coming out to learn more about Hartford Public Schools and for sharing your thoughts and concerns. We have established a protocol to track and respond to concerns raised. We want you to know that we take your concerns seriously and to that end, staff will follow up within 48 hours if followup is required via the preferred method of contact the speaker has indicated on the sign-in sheet. As

004a reminder, you have 3 minutes to speak. At the 2 minutes mark, the bell will ring letting you know that you have one minute left. At the second bell, please wrap up your comments. Now, this will be read in Spanish. at the Harford. It's normal. It's normal. Our first speaker is Robert Pokco. Good evening board members, members of the public, and welcome to our new superintendent, Dr. Townsel. I wish you much success in the uh coming days and weeks and years. So, welcome to Hartford. Uh I'm here tonight to speak on behalf of uh the naming of the classical magnet school for Hernandla Fontaine. As you noted, my name is Robert Pataco. I'm a retired educator who served 37 years in the Connecticut's public schools. I began my career in Hartford as a classroom teacher,

005went on to become the equal opportunity officer for the school system and that's the time that I worked directly for uh Hernand La Fontaine and then I concluded my time in Hartford as an assistant principal at Weaver High School. Um, I then went on to a career in Newington Suffield and concluded my uh tenure in the Connecticut public schools at Rocky Hill High School where I retired in 2007. After that, I worked for the Connecticut State Department of Education along with other retired superintendent and principles working in the major urban areas of Connecticut working on school and district improvement. But let me speak specifically to uh my relationship with Hernan and why I think it's so important that this occurs. During my tenure as the equal opportunity officer, I had the pleasure of serving under

006then superintendent Hernal La Fontaine. Superintendent La Fontaine brought numerous positive changes and initiatives to our school system. Among them was the creation of the classical magnet school and eventually uh the magnet school which started as a middle school moved on as a secondary program in Hartford public high school. I was one of the several staff members who participated in the creation and implementation of the program. Change is always hard in large institutions. This initiative was no different. But under Superintendent La Fontaine's vision and leadership, what began as a belief that urban students, if exposed to a rigorous classical education steeped in primary resources and high expectations, that they would succeed and flourish and this would become a reality. He enlisted the support of Trinity College who provided two professors from their classics department uh to

007support our work and the work of the teachers at Harper Public Quirk Middle School. Hernand facilitated the development of curriculum, the hiring of staff and ensuring the enrollment was open to all students. All students, not just the top tier students. Additionally, we ensure that an evaluation component became an integral part of the program to measure student achievement, curriculum alignment, and address any needs or weaknesses that may have arisen. I'm closing now. Superintendent La Fontaine's unwavering belief in the ability of our students to meet the challenges of this rigorous classical curriculum permeated all of our work. His insistence that expectations remain at the highest level was a constant in the lives of all of us that were part of that program. There is no doubt in my mind that Hernand la's vision for this program of

008excellence and the foundation that he was able to create is the reason that the classical magnet school still exists today. It is with much respect and deep admiration and appreciation for all that Hernand accomplished for the students of Hartford and the community of Hartford, I wholeheartedly support the proposal for naming the classical magnet school in his name. Thank you, [Applause] Joanne Jones. Good evening members of the board and superintendent council. Welcome. My name is Joanne Jones and I am a resident of Hartford. I am here in support of adding Hernand Lafantine's name to the classical magnet school. I have known Hernand for more than 20 years and I can share with you that he is a man of integrity who is respected and admired by me and many others for numerous reasons. On a personal

009basis, Hernand has been a friend, a supporter and a role model in his commitment to his neighbors, the schools and the community. His many accomplishments and contributions at the city, state, and national levels to promote equitable opportunities for students are well known. I would like to share with you one example of his leadership as an educator at the state level. The following is a resolution by Connecticut State University honoring Hernand La Fontaine. Hernand la Fontaine, superintendent of schools of Hartford is a widely recognized leader in urban education and her Hernand la was invited by President Dallas K. Beal of Connecticut State University to chair the university's commission on schools for the 21st century. a long range review of the needs of public schools and the requirements for change in teacher preparation. And Hernand chaired the

01018 member commission on schools for the 21st century devoting many hours of his busy schedule during a period of 17 months. And the commission on schools for the 21st century has now presented its final report to President Beal and to the trustees of the Connecticut State University. Therefore, be it that the trustees of the Connecticut State University recognize the leadership, the professional insights, the good humor and inspiration which her nan team provided to the commission on schools for the 21st century. As I look to close, I think it's important that you know that I believe that Hernand Laf Fontaine is most deserving of having his name added to the classical magnet school. And it's a wonderful opportunity for the Hartford Board of Education and the city of Hartford to honor one of their own. Thank

011you, Ted Sergy. Good evening, Madame Chair, Mr. Superintendent, members of the board. My name is Ted Sergy. I'm the former commissioner of education for the Connecticut State Department of Education. I hate to say it this way, but it feels like two generations back from where you are today. Uh, and I'm happy to see a very young school board sitting in front of us tonight. In the past, I think we've had a tendency to elect uh people my age, which would be a mistake um in terms of improving the Hartford public schools. So to Dr. Tonsel, I want to say that your remarks so far have been extraordinary. If you say raise the bar one more time, you'll hear me clapping in the background. There's nothing better than it seems to be than raising expectations. No

012reason every child shouldn't graduate and every child should have an opportunity to take an advanced placement course and continue their education. Known Hernand Lafantine for nearly 50 years. Um and I can't think of anyone I've met in these 50 years who really is more deserving and an honor of an honor like this. He started the classical magnet program here in Hartford. Widely uh loved and revered throughout Hartford, but also at the state level, at the national level uh in New York City. He he was the hero of bilingual education in New York prior to coming to Connecticut. I used to think of him as one in 1,000. He's in that group of people that you don't meet and work with on a regular basis. He served for 12 years as superintendent. Who does that anymore?

0131979 to 1991 or two. Uh, no one does that. In fact, his dedication and the continuity of leadership, which is why I would hope most of you board members will stay on for at least 12 years. Continuity is underrated. You don't even need to be the greatest star, but stay on the path. Test scores went up during his tenure. We just started state testing in 1979 as he arrived. He was thought of as the leader of urban education in the state by the commissioners I worked with while I was deputy commissioner of education. When he finished his time as superintendent, he didn't leave town. He got engaged in other activities. He ran for city council. He's been member a member of number of nonprofits and a counselor to a number of people who would continually

014seek his advice over these years. Threearters of my peers now reside in Florida or Arizona or California. Hernan and his wife Evelyn, also an educator, a great educator, stayed here in Hartford. This is a person of great expectations for the children. He was responsible for of the joy of being an educator and superintendent in your city. And he was a giant in this field. Uh from 1975 to 2025, over the last half century, I can't think of anyone more deserving of this honor. If you can find a way to vote yes uh to add his name to the classical magnet school, you'd be doing the right thing. Pleasure to see you all here tonight. Good luck, Mr. Superintendent. Thank you very much. >> Sherry Salon and Julie Mayahan. Good evening to the board of education

015members and good evening Dr. Townsen. My name is Julie Morningan and I was an educator in the Harford school system from 1975 to 20 thou 2020 2010. Um, I started out as an early childhood teacher and a special education teacher as well at Annie Fischer School and then at No Webster. And prior to my retirement, I was 14 years at Parkville Elementary School teaching kindergarten. My name is Shie Solon and I was a teacher in the Harford public schools for 35 years. I was a special education teacher at Vine Street School, Annie Fischer School, Rosson School, and then Bachelder School. My last nine years was spent teaching first grade at Bachelder. As past teachers in the Harford schools, we remember when Hernand la was the superintendent of the Harford public schools for 12 productive years.

016Whenever we discuss our recollections of the time that Hernand la Fontaine was superintendent, we agree that it was a very positive time for teachers, administrators, our students, and their parents. From 1979 to 1991, we had a superintendent who listened to his staff and the Harford families. He deeply cared about achievement and the welfare of all students. We also recall the positive effect that consistency at the top level had in both students and staff. Superintendent La Fontaine was responsible for standardizing the curriculum systemwide which had a favorable impact on the high rate of student mobility within the system. Superintendants came and went very quickly and there was no continuity in terms of vision or curriculum. This constant change of leadership was entirely disruptive to the educational process. Her non-lafontaine was the longest serving superintendent in the

017history of the Harford school district. He was a strong caring presence which added much needed stability to the school system. When we reconnected with Hernand La Fontaine as a fellow bowler, it was a pleasure. Just like when he was superintendent, he is concerned about each individual on our bowling team. He continues to exhibit his intelligence and compassion for others when interacting with his teammates. We are all continually impressed with his abundant energy, quick sense of humor, and his eloquent speeches at our yearly banquetss. He still exhibits a thirst of knowledge as he attends lectures and other events at local colleges, always open to adding information to his phenomenal memory. Hernan Laaf Fontaine was a genuine asset to the Harford public school system and naming a school in his honor is a very enlightened decision since

018his legacy would reflect well on the school system who wisely hired such an impressive administrator and all-around wonderful human being. Please allow others to remember Hernand la to the classical magnet school. You couldn't choose a more worthy educator to honor in this manner. Thank you respectfully, Katherine Babinsky, Julie Mouan, and Charie Solon. Richie Montinez Board of Education Chairperson, board members, and superintendent of schools, Dr. Townsa. I am very pleased to bring to your attention my enthusiastic support for the proposal to name the Harford public schools classical magnet school after an Nana Fontaine. I am a retired principal of the environmental sciences magnet school who was employed for over 38 years as an educator and administrator in the Harford public schools. I was I was able to serve during and Nala Fontaine's leadership as superintendent of

019schools. He was superintendent as you've heard before over more than 12 years and it certainly is remarkable that the longevity of his tenure has not been surpassed since the original establishment of the Harper public schools. And Alfa Fontaine was an effective, approachable, dynamic leader. His professional experience and guidance were essential factors in steadily improving the educational environment for all students in the Harford public schools. a knowledgeable, active and handson leader. He was widely known for among his school personnel, the students and parents all over the city. Because of his frequent and regular visits to schools and classrooms, because of his steady and adept leadership, he was able to stabilize the school district, unifying the curriculum throughout the district without interfering with teacher creativity, which had been previously in disarray. especially relevant among his many accomplishments

020when he established via the schools within a school concept and initiated the classical magnet program at Quirk Middle School which evolved of course as you know today the classical magnet school. I believe that this unique and essential history provides the most compelling rationale to to name the school in tribute to its founder Anala Fontaine classical magnet school. I eagerly hope that for your exped expeditious approval and implementation of the welldeserved symbolic honor to one of Harford's own respectfully Richie Montinez. Thank you [Applause] Raquel Calderon. Good evening board members. Good evening Dr. Council. I hope I'm pronouncing your last name correctly. I'm basically here to welcome you aboard and to join our team which are the teachers, substitute teachers, parents. you have a great team here and I'm excited that you're here and um uh I

021am sending you a a warm message and welcome from me and everyone Harford public schools. I have been working in Harford public schools for almost 20 years as a substitute teacher and I love the children. Um and recently Renuli Academy was you know was graded uh you know they had a good prize for in the state of Connecticut was recognized for one you know with a great award and um I normally work for um high school um and middle school and also for children and I love all the all the schools I I think they they are excellent teachers here and we're very very happy. I'm going to speak for them also that you're here and I am uh I just wanted to thank you very much for being here with us and join us.

022Thank you, Michael DS. Good evening. Uh my name is Michael DS. I live at 74 Rosemont Street in Hartford and I'm uh president of the Hartford Federation of Substitute Teachers. Um I'd like to apologize for missing the last uh meeting, last month's meeting. I haven't done that in over 20 years, but uh the things happen. I get mixed up on the days which day it was. I thought it was the following week, so I just completely missed it. Um, I'd also like to welcome um, uh, Dr. Andre Tonsel to our fine city. I', uh, city I've lived in for over 50 years. And, uh, in an area that I grew up in and, uh, spent my whole life here. Um, I'd like to welcome you and, urge you to get out there and see our

023city. There's a lot of interesting things here. Um, I enjoy living here. U I also what I want to do is uh I I realize that the wish school has uh that uh contracts that are out to bid and that's good but my neighbors are very concerned that nothing has started yet. So the I I you know I urge you to to uh pay attention to that board members and the superintendent to um just pay attention to that. Uh uh these schools uh school now has been out of out of uh commission for about three years and uh the students uh would like to get back into their neighborhood school. Also, Buckley High School, they've been they've been building it now, rebuilding it for about 10 years, and people are getting sick of uh not

024having Buckley High School and students being sent all over the city to uh have their fresh going one school for freshman and sophomore and another school for uh junior and senior. And that's no way to spend a a high school career. Um so, we we've got to get that that done quickly. And um I just uh also before I I I leave I just want to um state that uh it's long overdue. Dr. Council, uh vocational technical education needs to be brought back to our high schools and our middle schools. We don't have it and students graduate from high school. Many of them uh some do very well and go on to college and but some do not. And uh but if they had this vocational technical education, they would have a leg up. Thank

025you, Mike Susi. All right. Good afternoon. Um, usually I'm dressed a little more formal. Um, the rest of the board knows that, but um, I'm still kind of in denial that I'm going back tomorrow as a teacher and, um, yeah, so I decided to spend my time coming down to a board of ed meeting. Um, so the board, you obviously know how I how I am. So, I'm the type of teacher that I come down, I speak every month on behalf of my students. I'm a proud teacher from Hartford High, which also has its own history, just like Hartford has its own history. Um, it's the second oldest high school in the whole country. Um, but I have to speak because, you know, I always feel like our school isn't valued. Um, I speak for

026the students, I speak for the staff, I speak for support staff, anybody. If they come to me with a concern, I bring it up. Um, I'm hopeful and I'm weary of the next school year. So, I'm hopeful because I've I've seen on you you on TV a few times now. You just happened to pop up on channel 3 on Sunday. I was like, "Oh, that's my new superintendent." Um, and um, you know, I like the motto that you have about setting the bar, raising the bar. Um, eventually I'll get the whole thing down. Um, but I do like the comments that you've said. Um, I'm but I'm also weary just because I do have those issues where it's I'm I want to see that it gets put to I want to see it put to

027the test and I want to just know that it's not uh just rhetoric. Um, so I hope that you can prove that to me through your through your tenure here. Um, I'm weary also too because as the board has known for the past two years I've gotten displaced because of the lack of funding within the district. We've I think we've come to conclusion it's like an inequity problem. You know, Connecticut is interesting because you could drive from the west end of Hartford three blocks and you can drive into West Hartford three blocks and it's night and day between what you see. And that's just not right. a kid living on one side of Prospect A should not have a totally different um view of school as a student on the other side of Prospect a

028and I want to change that in our school and I've been trying as much as I can but I need the help if I need you know the superintendent I need you to do what you can to make sure that our system is more equitable that the schools get what they need that you listen to the people who come out to these board of ed meetings and I do like the fact that you're giving me eye contact because that shows me that you're listening and that makes me hopeful. Um, so you will see me at all these meetings. Um, I if I am not at these meetings, it is one of two reasons. I am either extremely sick. Um, or I have a function that I go to for my students, whether it's like a

029soccer game, a track meet. I know that some of you have seen me at track meets. Um, I try to go as to as many of the activities as I can for my students because I know that they need teachers like me who care, who stick up for them, and who do what they can to help out. Carol Gail. Good evening, members of the board, superintendent of schools. My name is Carol Gail. I'm the president of the Harford Federation of Teachers. First, I would like to welcome our new superintendent, Dr. Townsel. Uh, I welcome you not only to the Hartford public schools, but to the wonderful city of Hartford, my hometown. And certainly I I second the uh idea that you get to know Hartford and all of what it has to offer. On behalf

030of the Hartford Federation of Teachers, we look forward to working together for the benefit of all students in the Hartford Public Schools. There is a lot of work ahead of us towards that goal. In the last two months, I highlighted for this board the many areas in need of attention and improvement, including but not limited to special education, grading, discipline, grievances, staff retention, opportunity gaps, district responsiveness and communication, the district's relationship with unions, contracting out for bargaining unit work, culture and climate in some of our schools, and good faith bargaining. This Friday, HFT will actually hold its first monthly meeting with Superintendent Council and we look forward to begin to address some of these issues. Tonight, I wish to raise another issue that I have addressed before and find it important and critical at this

031moment in time to raise again and that is the issue of school consolidation. School consolidation has been discussed over the past year or so, and this board has even worked on a new policy regarding the process. The last time Hartford had a new superintendent, she was given a directive to consolidate schools. Given that Hartford again has a new superintendent, the folks out there that are pushing for consolidation of schools may believe that now is the time to once again push a new superintendent to consolidate schools. I stand before you or sit before you to emphatically say no to school consolidation. Doing so right now would be pennywise and pound foolish. Our former superintendent tackled school consolidation at a time of otherwise relative calm in our school system. The consolidation effort was the primary upset at

032that time. This would not be so today. Hartford is still recovering from the 2020 pandemic and its impact on our students. Hartford Public Schools is still reeling from budget cuts and layoffs for the past two years in a row as you just heard t uh Mr. Susi testify to. And Hartford Public Schools is at an all-time low in terms of staff morale. Staff don't feel valued. And despite district leadership touting how much they value staff, it's actions that speak louder than words. Because as a wise woman once said, "People may not remember what you say, but they always remember how you made them feel." Happy staff make for happy children. Passionate staff create inspired students. Supported staff lead to stronger academic outcomes for youth. To truly put students first means we must take care of

033our staff in whose care they reside. Hartford's district schools serve mostly black and brown students, most of whom qualify for free or reduced lunch. School consolidation focuses on district schools, further disadvantaging the already disadvantaged and further exploiting the already exploited. Hartford Public Schools as an institution, as we know, has to have been imbued with systemic racism since it was created a hundred years ago. Like all the other institutions, you, the board of education, and our new superintendent, Dr. Townsel, face a choice. You can allow our city youth to continue to be subjugated to the oppression of a racist system, or you can be the vehicles for change. If you choose to be the vehicle of change, stand up to the forces pushing school consolidation and say no, now is not the time. Further disruption is

034not what our kids need right now. Then I urge you to engage in a process, a process that is inclusive of staff voices, a process that is looking at to how best invest in our schools. Dr. Dr. Townsel, you urged our new teachers last week to make our schools places where children want to be in order to bring back those students who left Hartford for their choices. That is a vision worth fighting for. Mike McGary. >> My name is Mike McGary. I'm register voters. First like to welcome you to town and I hope you register. Just come down to city hall. It's a simple process. Um, now my concern of course is a concern I think of everybody in the city that our voting totals have been very low in the last few elections. The

035mayor election despite three qualified, hardworking, well financed candidates was a 14% turnout. The last presidential election we dropped 10,000 votes. So, I think it starts here, right here with the board of education and the new superintendent to try to help us change that a little bit. At least start with your young men and women that are approaching 18. They can register now. They can register this they register this spring and they can register this fall. They'll be voters for the next election, hopefully elections after that. Now, we had some success um this spring with most of the schools. The problem, of course, is when we do it at lunchtime in the larger schools, it's pretty tough. Big lines, guys, the girls, girls with the guys, and it's a happy time lunch. It's a hard time

036to talk about politics. But we did sign up in some cases several of the schools, every single kid, young man, young woman. And we felt good about that. But we're going to have to discuss with the staff, the principles, how we can do better. How when there's large numbers coming to lunch, it might not work that well. Maybe we could have an assembly. Maybe we could go to other meetings. There's got to be a better way because we get a little stories we tell our kids. I'll give you a quick one. One vote counts an awful lot. Who here knows the man, number two man in this city that lost by one vote in an election 2010. Number two man in the state. He won with two votes in a recount. Does anybody remember who

037that was? Matt Ritter. Matt Ritter now is, as you know, leader of the House and many think the second most powerful man in the state. So, one vote counts a lot and we want the kids to know that. We have a film and so on. So, we'd like to get more opportunities to have these young men and women get involved right away because we tell them how important it is. Part of adulthood is to be a voter. Your voter can change things and sometimes your vote can count a lot. Well, one more quick thing. City Hall visits ought to be considered. City Hall now is a great place. It's a beautiful building and then a certain age group, I'll leave it up to you to decide, should come in and visit city hall. It is

038a one of the most wonderful buildings in the state in the city and it's easy to get there. Simple. Everybody knows where it is downtown. Now, we're working on a history of that wonderful building and some other details with it. Right now, we're working on that. Wouldn't it be great that every young man or young woman at a certain age group comes in, they get to come around, maybe meet the mayor, council people, council offices, a town clerk, register our voters, and walk home with a piece of history that they could show their family. So, we'd like to do that and we'd like your cooperation and we'll work with the the staff in your office and maybe individuals here to try to do a little better than we have. Thank you very much. And our

039last speaker, John Walton Good evening, distinguished board members, and good evening, Dr. Tano, and welcome to Harford. I hope you guys had a good summer. We are still hoping for good weather to not leave us. Um, first off, and I'm with uh official Claude Watt, who is an electrician, who was going to speak tonight, but because of obligations to support our school openings, he didn't make it in time to sign up. So he's just here to support. Um to former superintendent Lafantine and his support group, there is nobody more deserving of such recognization. Um I am an alumnest of the classical magnet program. It helped save my life. It also helped teach me some of the philosophical views and values that I share with this group. But uh there's so many things I would like

040to bring to this this group, but such limited time to bring them. So I'm going to prioritize what I say. And Dr. Tanzo, I'm not the most uh accomplished speaker. So excuse me if I fumble on a few things, but I think you'll get the point. Um this group, I will give you credit uh board members as and I will share the truth with you as well and be transparent. uh being a part of the coalition of unions that was in a coalition with other parent groups and outside groups that demanded that we have a more open process to select the superintendent in that process be more transparent. I can't say that we got everything we wanted in that process but we did trust this group to advocate on our behalf and make the right

041decision. And you know after reading Dr. Tanzo's history and background outside of what we thought the process should be. We we actually are hopeful of the choice you did make. We can say that maybe if we were sitting in your position, we would have made a similar choice. So we are happy to have you, Dr. Tanzo. Local 566 is here and ready to work with you. I never introduce myself because it's not about me. I want you to focus on what the real issues are. So, one of the major positive things that did happen and I want to give some credit because you have some stars on your team. One of the some of the credits I want to do give is to our community partner director who and uh our COO and uh Dr.

042Ratley, who has been open to the communication and ideas we have brought, but also formulated along with others, formulated our ability to enhance our youth work program to over 70 kids this year off the streets and off our out of our neighborhoods that may have produc uh participated in negative behavior now doing something positive with working in our departments. That's a plus. We want to enhance that even more. We want to go from 70 to 150 to and OP was willing one of our partners to give us nearly 3 400 kids. We don't have the capacity yet to to house that many but we want to keep building this because I was reading your background Dr. Tanzu and one of the amazing things that I saw about it uh other than all the accomplishments that

043you have being a HB.CU see you graduate, working your way from the bottom all the way to the top, you know, being a good role model for men all over the country and young young women all over the country of all races and colors and creeds. But I noticed that in one of the reports it said that you almost got shot in the seventh grade. Or the reason I bring that up is because if we probably were to pull the person who pulled the trigger and just interview them now, that person probably was participating in crime because they didn't have an opportunity. So now we want to give our kids an opportunity not to be that same perpetrator that nearly took you away from this world. So that's what we are about. Local 566 is

044not about accolades and accomplishments. We're about actually working with our our our community and our students because we actually live here. I'm a parent. Official Wat is a parent. We live in this community. We we bleed sweat in this community. So, we're here for more than just, you know, a paycheck and we have a true true personal investment in our community. And we, Dr. Tanu would like to see you and your plan really activate and make sure that we get and raise that bar to where you said you wanted to raise it. One of the things I noticed when you said raising the bar, you said you had a plan for bringing back uh student enrollment and that's great and we feel to help you in that process that how you bring back student enrollment

045is to restructure that educational model to an attractive educational model to bring those kids back because the model that's in place right now the kids aren't attracted to because it's not meeting the direct need where they are right because yes, we want them to learn about math and English and science and all the wonderful things of education, but when they need a pair of sneakers or they need good food or they need a shirt on their back or pants and they don't want to be ridiculed by their community or other people who have things, then they're not focused on what the English teacher is saying. They're focused on an opportunity to be able to gain something in life that is meaningful to them at that particular time. And we think that can happen when you

046restructure the educational model to include the trades because the trades give our kids an opportunity to make have a real world job immediately. answer some of their financial and economical difficulties and then be open to the education and the broadening of education that you can give them. But if we don't meet their needs first, we will never get their attention. So 566 is here to work with you. 566 is here to partner with you. 566 is here to be collaborative with you. and we're hopeful that you will stay around long enough to then one day be thought of as the former uh superintendent La Fontaine and you will have those compliments as well. We thank you for our time and opportunity [Applause] to chair. Uh is there any way we can allow the gentleman who

047came to speak for him to speak some time to speak? >> Sure. Thank you, Mr. Wilson. >> If he's willing to. >> Yeah, absolutely. Go for it. Thank you. How are you? Um congratulations. Um biggest thing is is uh when dealing with children or dealing with crops, do you sit there? Do you blame the soil? Do you blame the the dirt? Do you blame the rain? Or do you blame the sun? Or do you blame the farmer? And I believe all of us here are farmers. So let's get in the ground. Let's get get dirty with it. These kids need it. They deserve it. I mean, eventually they're going to be this one day, you know? So, as a dad, I want my kids to be better than me. For the kids of Harford, I

048want to be better than us. That's our future. That's how I look towards it. So, thank you so much. Thank you for the opportunity. [Applause] >> And that concludes public comment. >> Excellent. Thank you. And thank you everyone for coming out and speaking tonight. And welcome back, Mr. Walton. So, now I know the public comment is over. Thank you. I appreciate you. It's been a long summer, everyone. Um, all right. Uh, we'll now move on to the report of the chair. And this will be the shortest report I have ever given as chairperson tonight. Um, it has has been a great summer. So, uh, today board members uh, Mr. Tatum, Mr. Walker, Mr. Mills, Mr. Strata Perez, and Mr. Wilson were excited to join the community at the district's back to school event. They got

049a chance to meet with families, staff members, and share information with the board. And that is it. So as a reminder, you can find the superintendence report, full committee report, student reports, all attachments and videos in the meetings agenda on board docs. All committee and workshop meetings are livereamed as well as viewable after the meeting. The YouTube links are saved in each meeting's agenda on boards. I highly encourage the community to view the meetings and read the reports when possible. If you have any questions or feedback, please contact Miss Christina Santiago, our board liazison at cantiagoartfordschools.org. And it is my honor and pleasure to now turn it over to Dr. Townsel for the report of the superintendent. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Thank you, Chair Hockenhol. Uh so ladies and gentlemen, I'm on my

050100 day tour and I just want to share with you what I'm learning so far. Uh during my first three weeks, I've had the opportunity to visit um one of our schools in full operation, Capitol Prep, and I met with the entire student body and their faculty to share some insights of what we expect, especially when we talk about raising the bar. I was also able to share some time at our new teacher induction event at Weaver High School where I met our new slate of teachers as well as our HFT's president, Carol Gail. had the opportunity to visit our print shop, food and nutrition, and our folks with buildings and grounds. I was also able to speak at the August Leadership Institute yesterday with all of our administrators as we prepare for the first

051day of the 202526 school year. And uh I'll share this later, but I also had the opportunity to uh speak with all of our partners at our onboarding opportunity at the Capitol Community College over at the um state, that building right there. And um let me give you some insight, ladies and gentlemen. I've hit the ground running u especially with the media. I don't know what it is, but I've been in front of about six or seven cameras. Uh but the goal is is to get the message out there. It's very simple, but it's powerful. It's set the bar, meet the bar, exceed the bar, and raise the bar. And I know that sounds cliche, but it's not. When people ask, "Dr. Townsel, what is the recipe for young people or adults or or or

052that's the recipe. That's the formula, and the goal is to see how does Hartford Public School fit in that." Uh, since onboarding on August 4th, uh, my superintendent of school, I had one-on-one interviews with NBC, Telmundo, 1080 a.m., News Talk Radio, Channel 3, the Hartford Current, and Fox 61. right before I >> talking about professional learning and it's very important that we always talk about building capacity in all of our educators. Staying true to our vision of district-wide cross- sector collaboration, we ensure a clearly defined and transparent coordination of professional learning sessions to ensure that all of our staff are equipped to help deliver high quality teaching and learning opportunities for all of our students. This include professional learning for our principles, assistant principles, school counselors, social workers, FCSSPs, teachers, executive assistants, office assistants, and

053whoever work in Hartford public schools. Professional development and the scope and sequence across the department are inclusive of special education, teaching and learning, multilingual teams, and school leadership team. and we aim to develop a more cohesive plan to assure collaboration across all of the listed items above. While our students were enjoying the last few weeks of st summer, our dedicated staff have been hardworking preparing for day one of the school year. Just as our students are benefiting from the continuous learning and growth, so do our educators. Professional learning began last week at the new teacher induction where we welcomed 77 of our new teachers and provided them with information on curriculum, resources, climate and culture information and more. Our principles, assistant principles, veteran teachers and executive assistants and office staff also had professional learning opportunities

054last week while our para educators will convene on August the 21st. and all groups are discussing best practices, discovering new strategies, and grounding themselves in the mission, vision, and goals of Hartford Public Schools. Hartford Public Schools is committed to providing a well-rounded education for every student, especially our growing population of multilingual learners. This summer, a dedicated group of middle and high school teachers engaged in professional development focused on strengthening support for these students, and we'll continue to do that. An update from our welcome center. The Hartford Public Schools welcome center processed and triaged 346 intakes for service and information in the month of July. The top 10 reasons for these intakes were homelessness, enrollment, summer school, school records, bus passage, transportation, workpapers, clothing, student transfers, and regular uniform assistance. We will continue to provide all

055of the resources needed to assist our families in multiple capacities. And today we had the opportunity for our families to visit Duncan Park when we also shared resources. Hartford Public School was the recipient of summer mindful grant. This outreach would offer the mindfulness activities and resources to all Hartford young people and their families. Hartford Public Schools hired 12 part-time school social workers to offer mindfulness services, activities, and resources in our afterchool program and citywide gym and recreation sites. Over 600 young people received mindfulness services and activities. Our social workers went to the family city went to a family citywide get ready for school event and planned mindfulness as a tool and strategy to over 100 families giving them the materials and resources. And when you talk about mindfulness, you can also include social and emotional

056learning. And those five core competencies are self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-makings. Health record requirements. If students are new to the district, families must submit a physical and immunization record to the school before it starts. If your young person return is a returning student who is entering preK4, kindergarten, 7th, or 11th grade, a physical and updated immunization record is required. We are sharing the C. But we are sharing the Connecticut Department of Public Health link and list the immunizations required to attend school. If families do not already have a primary care provider for their children, we are sharing information about those available clinics in Hartford and our summer clinic clinics below. Hartford Public School nurses, dental, and medical clinic staff are excited to start the year providing services to our students to

057keep them healthy and learning. With regards to our no call summer clinic, Hartford public schools are holding no call summer clinics for each school entry physical educa physicals and immunization and it's available to any Hartford resident from kindergarten through 12th grade and they begin on August 19th. On the first day of school, which is August 26th, Tuesday, I'm excited to join Calling All Brothers, our partners, and community members at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School and Breakthrough Magnet School North to welcome students back to school. Additionally, I will be going to all of our schools, all 39 of them, uh, throughout the first and second week of school to, uh, champion our young people getting back to school. Now, let me be brief on our operations. I'd like to be brief because this report

058can be over an hour long, but you can find it on board docs. With regards to food service and nutrition, the department is is prepared to welcome our students back and they're excited for our meal program. The transportation department has been working extremely hard to prepare the start of the school year and our team have completed the initial phase of routing all student requests and are now focused on communicating this information to our families. The upcoming fall athletic season is set to begin with high school sports on August 18th, followed by middle school sports on September 7th. This fall, there are 17 middle schools across the district offering a total of 36 teams. So, one thing or one cheat code I like to tell our young people and their families, a great way to be

059engaged in school is to be a part of enrichment opportunities, including athletics. So, I encourage our families to get their young people involved there. The building and grounds department have successfully completed numerous projects over the summer to prepare our schools for the academic year. The education technology operations department focused on ensuring a smooth start to the year by equipping all of our new hires with laptops and confirming schools that they have the necessary devices to start the academic year. Now this is very important because this is about office of enrollment and school choice. To ensure the great start of the year, the office of enrollment and school choice launched a multi-tered campaign designed to engage families in school readiness planning starting July. Those new to Hartford or enrolling a child for the first time are

060encouraged to register. This is a win-win for all stakeholders as families are afforded the opportunity to get their noted schools and the district leaders are able to continue operational planning. Now, let me say this. Um, I had the opportunity today to meet with the president of the Hartford Promise. Now, here's a guarantee and all of our young people and their families who choose other schools and live right here in Hartford, I need them to listen to this and listen to this very care carefully. If you are a Hartford resident and a graduate of a Hartford public school high school, if you have a 3.0 gradepoint average, a 93% attendance rate, you are eligible to receive a $100,000 scholarship to a school of your choice, and is not capped to a number of students. Any student

061who meet the criteria is automatically guaranteed. Now, I'm sharing that because we have young people and families choosing other schools. You can go to the other school because it appears to be the best opportunity, but when you're guaranteed a 100% uh guaranteed a $100,000 scholarship just by being the best version of yourself in Hartford Public School, I think that is an added value. And I I plan to share that message early and often throughout my tenure here. And I do believe that that would be a strategy to maintain some of our young people right here in Hartford public school. You're guaranteed a $100,000 scholarship to a school of your choice. And we've all heard about the Hartford Promise, but the question is how is it being marketed? How is it being promoted? And who is

062it limited to? It's not limited to anybody. If you meet the criteria, you will absolutely get it. Celebrating our growing our own success. I'm happy to highlight our grow our own achievements. This year there were 14 staff members who will participate in year one and year two of the relay graduate school of education program. Five of whom have already rostered as teachers for this upcoming school year. With regards to safety and security, the Office of School Safety and Security look forward to the upcoming 2526 school year, and safety is our number one priority. And the very last thing I'll share, ladies and gentlemen, is our back to school celebration, which was today. We had about 5,000 people walk through those Duncan Park gates and we really appreciate those families, community members, anyone who had a

063stake in not only making that happen, but wanting to see the best that Hartford has to offer. I do believe that our next move will be our best move. So, starting August 26, everyone needs to come back to school fired up, ready to go, and locked in so we can have a great academic year. I'll park my bus on that. Thank you. Thank you so much, Dr. Townsel. All right, we're now going to move on to the business agenda. So, item 4.1, administrative appointment, principal sports and medical sciences academy. Motion that the Hartford Board of Education approves the superintendent's recommendation for the principal of sports and medical sciences academy. Do I have a motion? >> So move. >> Second. >> All right. Thank you so much. Uh, Dr. Tonsil, back to you. >> Thank you,

064Chair Hockenhal. I humbly ask that the board of education approve our selection for principal of the sport and medical science academy. The candidate we selected is Mr. Matthew Gaffne. And I'll share a brief um bio. Mr. Gaffne is the finalist for principal of sport and medical science academy. He currently serves as an assistant principal at Breakthrough Magnet South and holds a certification in mathematics and administration. Mr. Gaffne also served as an administrator in Windsor, an instructional coach and a high school mathematics teacher. Mr. Gaffne demonstrates the profound knowledge of sport and medical science academy and its community and articulates a strong actionable vision for improving school climate through his commitment of establishing trust. His leadership is inspired by a dataininformed approach and he remained dedicated to instructional priorities as well as student, staff, and family

065engagement. I ask that the board of education approve this appointment. >> Thanks, Dr. Townsel. Welcome, Mr. Gaffne. Uh, would you like to say a few words before I turn it over to the board? >> Sure. Um, good evening, members of the board, uh, Superintendent Townsel, and members of the Harford community. I am deeply grateful and truly excited for the opportunity to serve as sports and medical science academy community. My vision for SMSA is to return to the true spirit of our theme where sports, medical science, and STEM are not just areas of study but meaningful pathways that ignite passion and inspire our students futures. I want our school to be a place where every student, staff member, and parent feels a genuine sense of belonging, care, and pride. At SMSA, I envision a culture that

066feels like family, where relationships are built on trust, respect, and shared commitment to student success. By fostering strong, lasting partnerships with families, community organizations, and industry leaders, we can create a network of support and opportunity that surrounds our students at every step of their journey. A central part of this vision is creating meaningful experiences for our students through partnerships in the fields of sports, medical science, and STEM. These authentic opportunities will allow students to see themselves in future roles, develop essential skills, and walk away with the confidence to pursue their passions. Equally important is a commitment to raising expectations for every member of our school community. I believe that all students can and will rise to the level of challenge we set when given the right support. This means holding ourselves to high standards of

067academic rigor, character, and responsibility while ensuring that no student is overlooked or underestimated. At SMSA, excellence should not be the exception. It should be the expectation. By cultivating a culture where students are encouraged to step beyond their comfort zones a and staff are empowered to innovate and grow, we will elevate the entire school community. By weaving these experiences and expectations into the fabric of SMS learning becomes more than preparation for the future. It becomes a living inspiring journey of discovery. students will leave us not only academically prepared but also as confident, compassionate leaders ready to make meaningful contributions to their communities and the world. I would be honored to step into this role and I am eager to collaborate with the entire SMSA community. I look forward to building our strengths, building on our strengths

068and helping SMS reach its f uh fullest potential. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Gaffne. Uh I'll open it up to the board. Any questions or comments? Minister Walker. >> Sure. Um thank you, Chair. Um congratulations um on this um upcoming appointment. Uh in terms of returning SMSA to its roots. um te talk about how uh you may incorporate um certification programs into the offerings um that students may experience while attending SMSA. I'll let you >> sure talk to that. >> So I would be looking to there's limited partnerships currently at SMSA from what I understand and the um through the interview process as well as talking to members of the community. I would look to strengthen the current partnerships we have, but also develop new partnerships. Um, when I was assistant principal at Breakthrough

069North or Breakthrough South, sorry, we've had uh a number of partnerships with Hartford Healthcare, Harford Yard Goats, um, and a number of other hands-on Hartford is another example. And I would tap into those in order to create opportunities for our students so that they can get those real world experiences and what they need to really why they came to SMS which is for that theme of medical and sports science. >> Yeah. Quick followup. So um yeah, I invite you in that same way to to look for actual certifications so students can get get in their hands from that. I know that we employ um um um PT I was going to say um trainers, >> right? Who I would love to see us be able to engage them beyond the work they do with us

070to actually find ways to engage our students and give them new opportunities in that way um to maybe open the door. I know we have areas uh in the region, phabbotomy and other areas where students get certifications as they're leaving the high school experience and I I'm excited to see what you'll be doing next. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> This is a comment, not a question. Uh but when I was a more youthful lad that I am today, uh I was able to play soccer with my team against SMSA at Dylan Stadium uh before they renovated it and made it so that you wouldn't get tetanas. Uh I just would like to say that I really hope that uh if approved that you work with whatever leverage you have to be able to

071use Dylan Stadium uh and Colt Park next door because I think those are amazing community assets that I'm not quite sure we as a district have been able to use uh to its fullest potential. So just hopefully you can get that accomplished. Thank you. Um mine is just a quick comment following up on um what a board members chaired. Um uh on top of like phabbotomy, I think another really good opportunity is EMTB. Um it's certainly a field that's needed. Um and it's certainly a field that young people can access and I know back in my day they offered it. I I think Weaver had it and so I think that's another really good opportunity because it is something that's uh definitely needed in the community. It's a good way in. >> Good evening. So,

072because you are entering this new school community, um could you speak a little bit about how you're going to get staff to rally behind you um to buy into um what you're going to bring to um sports science? Um, so one thing I am certainly going to do is really make time for the staff to speak with me, um, to hear their concerns, their frustrations, as well as celebrate whatever successes that SMSA and personally they've had. Um, oftentimes we talk about the fact that we spend more time in our school communities oftentimes than we do with our own families. And so really it's important to me and it has been at Breakthrough South to create a culture where we care for one another and that doesn't happen overnight. I understand that. But I feel like

073through trust and transparency and being visible and making sure that the staff is taken care of and their needs are important such as as the students are. if they have a need that's not being met, then they're not able to meet our students needs as well. So, I want to do my very best to make sure that our staff feel seen and heard and that our students are then allowed to be seen and heard as well. >> All right, seeing no more questions. All right. Uh the motion on the floor is that the Harford Board of Education approve Matt Gaffne for principal of sport and science medical sciences academy. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Nays abstensions. The eyes have it. The motion moves. Congratulations. >> Thank you. >> All

074right. Moving on to item 4.2, administrative appointment, principal Dwight Blizzy, a dual language academy. Motion that the Hartford Board of Education approves the superintendent's recommendation for the principal of Dwight Bizzy Dual Language Academy. >> Do I have a motion? >> So move. >> Second. >> All right. Uh back to you, Dr. Tonsel. >> Thank you, chair. I ask that the board approve the principal of Dwight Bizy Dual Language Academy. The candidate that we selected is Karen Barney and I'd like to share a brief description of who she is. Miss Karen Barney most recently served as the acting principal for Dwight Blesy Dual Language Academy, demonstrating a strong knowledge of the school's culture, history, and instructional priorities. In her brief tenure as the acting principal, she brought a strong sense of school familiarity and understands the

075important importance of community connection. Her previous experiences as a special education teacher as well as a school and central office administrator has shaped her disposition as an educator with a keen awareness on the specific needs of our learners. Miss Barney is a proven leader who centers on driving school progress. She is knowledgeable of district processes and priorities and is committed to establishing a datadriven culture centered on student academic achievement. I humbly ask that the board approve the selection for principal of the Dwight Bizy Dual Language Academy, Miss Karen Barney. >> Thank you, Dr. Tonsel. Hello, Miss Barney. Would you like to say a few words before I turn it over to the board? >> Yes. Uh good evening, superintendent uh and members of the board. I'm sitting here tonight with a deep sense of gratitude

076and humility. Thank you for this incredible opportunity to be the next principal of Dwight Bizy. I am so honored and truly excited to get to work with the student, staff, and families of this wonderful community. I've admired Dwight Bley for a long time. Its unique spirit and its drive to give students an innovative education. My goal isn't to come in and change things to, but to build on the wonderful foundation that's already here and to make sure this school remains a place of real opportunity for every single child who walks through the doors. At the heart of the school is its incredible dual language program. It's more than just a program. It's the core of who we are and it's a huge part of our students success. It's not just about learning Spanish and English.

077It's about opening up a child's mind. We know from research and we see it in our hallways every day that this kind of learning helps our kids become better problem solvers, more flexible thinkers. And the most important part, it builds empathy. It creates bridges between cultures. We are preparing students who are aren't just bilingual, but who are truly bicultural, citizens of the world, ready for the future. That's why I'm passionate about protecting and expanding this program as we grow into a full prek to 8 magnet school. This is our chance to give students a continuous path to biiteracy from the very first day of school right through middle school. And as we do that, we also bring in more arts and enrichment activities. So every child has the chance to find what they love and

078what they're passionate about, even if they don't know it yet. You have my word that I will lead collaboratively. My door will always be open. I see my primary role is supporting our amazing teachers and building real partnerships with our families and the community. Together, we will create a school culture of high expectations and deep support. A place where every single student feels challenged, valued, and empowered to be their best. Thank you again for this incredible honor. an opportunity and I would love to accept this responsibility with my whole heart and roll up my sleeves and begin the important work assign alongside you, the students, the staff and the community. >> Thanks, Miss Barney. I'll open it up to the board. Any questions, comments? >> Mr. Thank you, Madam Chair, and um thank you for

079your dedication to um Hartford and in all the roles that you have throughout your career. I'd just like to appreciate um the ways that you have answered the call to educate in our community and uh look forward to seeing uh what you can bring in this new role. >> Thank you, >> Miss Brody. Sorry. So I'm I'm going to speak from a personal space because some of us do have children in the system. So we interact with the staff. So I have no doubt um about your leadership because you've led um a conversation um even between myself um as a parent fighting for what I think my child should have. just bridging that gap and making um everyone know their role in what we do um for our students from the families to the um

080to our staff. Um so the way you led in that situation, it it let me know like personally um your capabilities and the great job you'll do um leading um at Dwight Bizzy. >> Thank you. and >> um thank you chair and I want to also congratulate you for uh your commitment to the district and um and for this new opportunity. I really want to um pose a question and give you the opportunity to talk about um your commitment to growing dual language um at your school. Um I know um you have a lot of talents and I really want you to talk about on the record what you're going to do to both grow uh dual language capacity. We know that it builds cognitive development and and intellectual flexibility and so just give you

081the opportunity on the record to say that and and at some point maybe continue to win some converts over to this. >> Sure. Uh so uh as our shirt said today at the yard goats uh dual language is our superpower and so a part of um supporting and growing the dual language program is really ensuring that we're working collaboratively from prek through 8. So right now the model is um really strong across grade levels but they still feel very separate like we're running an elementary school and a middle school versus a true dual language academy. So just starting to uh tomorrow because tomorrow's we have our teachers back. We're bringing them all together and everyone's getting the same message and they're working collaboratively across teams and then we're really anchoring professional learning in three uh

082around three big rocks that are connected to um our data, our goals, but also rooted in dual language. And then we're building out um professional learning where everyone's going to work collaboratively in grade level pairs um and out and vertical teams as well. So like middle school might be working with elementary to share best practices in the uh ARC curriculum which is that the curriculum we utilize for dual language. Um so that way everyone is uh sharing out the programs there. And then as I lifted we're also expanding our arts and our enrichment because um dual language shouldn't just live within the curriculum. it should live in everything that we do. So, we just added an art teacher back um and we will be utilizing that teacher to integrate what we are doing in the

083curriculum and in the classroom across uh the content and so that students can show that and connected to our dance as well. And then we're starting by building out enrichment programming in our middle school um where teachers from different grade levels administration we can all uh do something around um either you know cultural uh Spanish English heritage that students can then select that would then have their interest level. So that's where we're starting. Um but the bigger picture is to really get um everyone to understand the model to see success in the model and then have everyone from prek to eight on the same page. >> Um thank you. I'd be um excited to hear about the results as you go through this journey. Thank you. One last look and oh yep, >> I just

084want to say welcome and your energy is invigorating. It's exciting and I love this innovation for Hartford. As a person who speaks multiple languages, it's important that culture is represented and I'm excited to see the work that you're going to do. >> Thank you. >> All right. Seeing no other hands, the motion on the floor is that the Hartford Board of Education appoint Karen Barney for principal of Dwight Pizzy Dual Language Academy. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Nays abstensions. The eyes have it. The motion moves. Congratulations, Miss Barney. >> Thank you. Right. Item 4.3, contract approval, readyct. Motion that the Hartford Board of Education authorized the superintendent to execute a contract with ReadyCCT for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $494,800 uh ending June 30th, 2026.

085Do I have a motion? >> So move. >> Second. >> All right. Uh I am now going to throw it to Dr. Albert Saki, Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning. Welcome. The floor is yours. >> Good evening, um, members of the board. Thank you, um, board chair Haken Hall and, um, our superintendent, Dr. Townsel. Uh, my name is Dr. Al Saki, um, the assistant superintendent of teaching and learning, and I'm very excited and honored to be here, um, and to be a part of this dynamic team. Um today I'm just going to be speaking briefly about um our contract with um CT um ReadyCCT. Um so this was shared at the committee meeting. So I'm just going to give you sort of like a big overview of um ReadyCICT. Ready is a Connecticut-based nonprofit providing

086career connected learning opportunities in partnership with Hartford Public Schools since 2011. Ready CT currently operates in five Hartford schools which include Bucklay High School, Hartford Public High School, Weaver High School, Great Path Academy, and Pathways Academy offering students access to eight distinct career pathways including emerging technologies, public service, allied health, engineering, insurance and finance, journalism and media, general focus, and information technology. Each school has at least one pathways and others have two. The impact on our students based on these pathways have been um extremely powerful. Students benefit from industry informed learning, dual enrollments, recognized credentials, paid internships, and structured work-based learning with signature programs such as YES Academy, Grit, Student 5.0. Student 5.0 actually targets high school seniors and recent graduates and helps them with support and a dedicated career launch coordinator. Students in the

087program are also offered paid internship and wraparound support. An example of the impact of readyct is from Weaver High School. At Weaver High School, up to 100% of ReadyCct pathway participants and 98% of work-based learning participants graduated with academic performance above the school average. Ready CT supports district strategic goals including whole and healthy students, expansive learning opportunities and operational and management excellence. Also, approval for state magnet grant, which is expected to provide additional funding, is still pending. Although a decision was anticipated around August 11th, no decision has been received to date. The district is requesting board approval to use funds received from the city for the comprehensive high schools to cover this cost. The district is also requesting approval for the Great Path Academy contract contingent upon receiving the anticipated state magnet grant. The total

088contract among um amount for ready CT is for 494,800 of which 140,800 is for great path academy. Um I'll have a few people here with me. I'll have um Shannon just um share some additional information and then I will have Neil share a little bit more. >> Good evening. Can you hear me? Good good evening uh Harford Board of Education. It's just a pleasure to be in front of you and a big welcome to Dr. Townsel. Uh very excited to have you as part of the community. Um so my name is Shannon Marimone. I'm executive director with ReadyCT. Uh as uh as Dr. Saki referenced. We are a statewide nonprofit that works at the intersection between K12 education and career connected learning and making sure that students are getting a lot of exposure and access

089and preparation for the world of work so that they can be set up for success whatever path they choose. Um our core philosophy is that there are many paths to success. There is no such thing as a one-sizefits-all pathway. Um, so we want to make sure that we're providing really uh scaffolded and tiered experiences that arm students with as much information as possible to make the decisions about what comes next for them when they graduate from high school. Um, our we are also an affiliate of the state chamber of commerce, the Connecticut Business and Industry Association, which is a great uh collaboration in the sense that we tap into their business membership in order to provide that access and opportunity to students and educators across Hartford Public Schools as well as other districts that we

090partner with. And because we partner with multiple districts across the state, we're able to learn best practices, things that work well in one place that we can bring to another school setting. um while adapting to local context in order to make as many enriching experiences available to students as possible. And speaking to some of the questions that have come up, we do things as referenced uh by Dr. Saki such as industry recognized credentiing, making sure that students graduate with those kind of that that asset in hand so that they can apply that in whatever path they take. Um we also do a lot of uh career readiness and employability skills uh instruction as in the form of workshops inclusive of uh budgeting, communications, personal branding, team building, all all the topics that you would want

091to make sure that your future workforce is prepared in. Um and then we do a lot in the realm of uh infusing the content in coursework in tandem with teachers to make sure that there's industry uh informed curriculum that's coming into into the um school and the industry partners themselves are coming in as guest speakers offering job shadowing experiences. And ultimately our goal is to provide every student who wants one within the five schools that we work with a paid internship experience. And our typical paid internship is 120 hours in total. And we pay just above the minimum wage because we also want to show students the value of their work. And then that helps obviously with also uh personal responsibility around budgeting and financial management. Um so happy to answer any questions. I'm joined

092by two of my colleagues Dan Williamson and Tammy Schwikert who are directors of career pathways and support our program team across the greater Hartford region. and we would welcome any questions that you have. >> Great. Thank you both. I'll turn it over to my board fellow sorry fellow board members. Mr. Walker, were you getting ready to say something? >> Yeah, >> go for it. >> Thank you. I do. So, um I I saw really CT and and and work at uh Buckley High School and so I was uh impressed with what I saw and so I wanted to one um ask the uh the 50K that's kind of earmarked for for for stipens. >> Um do we have an idea of how many students are are helped uh by the current level stipens? So, so

093we um offer the paid internship experience and we fund that through a variety of different funding sources. We we are also a uh provider for the summer youth employment and um education and learning program with CWP, but we only receive a certain number of slots through that program. So then in order to have parity with all students, we secure funding through other sources to make sure that there's we can provide a consistent uh a slightly above minimum wage um salary to each student. Um so we put that uh aotment aside based on the benchmark of we've been serving um approximately 250 students per year in paid internships and our goal is to even exceed that in the coming year. So, we're just putting that in to make sure that we can cover that cost for

094any student who wants the paid internship experience. >> Okay. So, yeah, I would excitedly see if we can grow that because I would like to see more students helped. Um the a follow-up question. Let's have um two more. One is um can you talk about the certification students receive? And then my last question is talking about how uh the soft skills that you teach and expose students to how are you working to give these same skills to the local teaching staff so they can >> offer these you know skills to other students within the school setting. >> Sure. No, great questions. Um so in terms of the industry recognized credentials those vary by pathway. Um so as Dr. Saki mentioned we support a number of industry specific pathways. So for the healthcare pathway at Harford

095public high school we would be offering first aid CPR stop the bleed QPR suicide prevention. Um we do partner with capital state CT state capital and offer a patient care technician um EMT EMR. Uh we're also looking at um uh medical assistant and phabbotomy and we've been looking into farm tech but that that has some age restrictions. So we're always thinking about how do we up the Annie and offer more and more of those credentials especially as more students are demanding them uh and very interested in them. Uh other pathways for instance the engineering and green technology pathway there's a credential that we've been providing with for drone certification. So they v vary by pathway, but they're also not exclusively limited to the students in those pathways. If a student wanted to participate in receiving

096an industry recognized credential and they weren't formally part of the pathway, we would make that available to them as well. uh in terms of building capacity of educators across the schools in which we work. We work in partnership with uh educators, counselors, social workers, family community liaison, anyone we can work with, administration um to show the the in the lessons that we're providing, do them together, um and show that we can kind of transfer that knowledge and ex expand it so it reaches as wide a range of members of that school community as possible. Um, so it's it's a constant reinforcement and also thinking about long-term transition if if we were to gradually release the work uh and have the district take it on going forward. >> Thank you. >> Yeah, Mr. T. >> Just

097a very quick follow-up question to clarify the 250 students that you said are in paid internships, is that Harford Public School students or is that state across the state? That's just Hartford public school students. >> Thank you. >> Other questions? >> Oh, on the stairs. >> I just have more of a comment than a question. I just wanted to um just say that I'm very grateful for the information the information that's that we have um board members have in the um packet from the August 6 committee of the whole meeting that goes into detail about readyCT and all the information that we need. So I'm very grateful for that. >> Thank you. Miss Brody. So, what I am hoping um I won't be supporting the vote tonight uh for my own personal reasons. Um on

098we we had to cut teachers and we had no choice about this contract. Um so it wasn't in our hands to do what we wanted to do with funding. So I won't be supporting it um for that reason. I wish of course success but what I am hoping um because I'm thinking it will pass what will happen is that our staff are directly connected to these pathways um so that when we are not engaged with readyCT that our staff have has those connections um to do this work um because I believe Um we we have done this work in the past. We've had have had um Weaver High School with the drone um in the FAA certifications. We have had phabbotomy um trained students who left you know with a job offer like they were

099waiting like when you graduate you 18 we got a job offer for you. So we we know how to do that work and we definitely have done that work. Um, but what I am um hoping that that there's no gatekeeping, give our staff access to these pathways so we can further have these opportunities for our students um when we no longer have um the partnership. Thank you. >> Thanks, Miss Bro. >> Go ahead. quickly. Um I wanted to make a comment in support of um bilingual kind of access. We have a lot of English language learners as well as >> who I'm encouraging you to find ways to incorporate them, >> but we also have monolingual students who bilingualism can be a skill in the marketplace as well. So I don't know if you find

100partnerships that allow that to happen too. So, I'm just throwing it out there as an additional offering that that ought to be had. You can comment >> if you would like. >> No, that is a definite priority for us. Um, not only multilingual language learners, but also um students who are on an IEP or 504 plan. Um, we are always looking for ways to meet that student where they are and provide internship experiences um that celebrate the assets that they bring to the role. And so we did this year offer a a series of internships that were for Spanish- speakaking students in particular and then also paired for students who um for whom English was not their first language had someone on their team who was bilingual who could help with translation when needed and

101bring that student along. And so we've been very mindful of that. We also translate our um marketing materials andformational materials into different languages. We're we're looking to increase that so that we can again whatever family member or student we're working with has the ability to understand what we're offering and can take advantage of it. Um I is it possible just to to um respond to Miss Miss Browy's remark? Um, I I really appreciate your cander and I just want to mention that one of the things that we're trying to create is par across the career pathways in Harford public schools because some of the pathways are um sponsored and supported by employers in the community and those are established and we don't expect those to go away. Um, and so what the goal is and

102those are partnerships with ReadyCT that have been going going back to um 2011. One of them actually even goes back to 2008 with with United Technologies, which has now become RTX. And those four pathways um are kind of they're they're established and we hope those will continue. And the goal with this funding is to bring parity to the other schools so that the pathways in those schools can have the same access and resources. And then the hope is to find additional sponsorship and partners so that those can be sustainable into the future. If that doesn't happen, if that's not the case, then our full intention is to, as I mentioned before, set the school up with as much uh resources and a toolkit to continue to do this work whether or not ACC is there.

103So, that has always been our commitment. Sorry, thank you very much. All right, see Oh, yeah. Go ahead. >> I have a question. It's actually about the funding. you mentioned that um we were waiting till August 11 to hear from the state and we haven't and therefore we're asking for a certain amount of money to be used. Can you repeat that just for for >> Yes. So um we were initially supposed to hear back from um the state by August 11th with whether um with the funding or or the um award notice. Um as of now we still have not heard back from the state. So, the goal is to use the funding that was provided to um the funding that was provided by the city to cover the cost and when once the grant

104money does come in then to um use it um from the money that was taken out of the city funds. >> Okay. But it is expected to come in. >> Yes, as far as I know. Yes. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Seeing no other hands, I do want to say I am really grateful for what you do as a CPA. The fact that there are students at Weaver High School that get paid internships at a big four CPA firm, I think is life-changing for those students along with all the other great things that you're doing, but that is my personal absolute like thing I've loved the most about being on the board is learning this thing that you do. So, thank you so much for ch literally changing the lives of students. So,

105all right, with that, the motion on the floor is the Hartford Board of Education authorized the superintendent to execute a contract with ReadyCct for the term outlined in the contract. not to exceed $494,800 ending June 30th, 2026. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Nays abstensions. Okay. So that's one nay, one abstension, Christina, in case you didn't hear. Um, the eyes have it. The motion moves. Thank you very much for presentation tonight. >> Thank you all very much. Thank you. >> All right. Item 4.4 Four, contract approval, CT RISE. Motion that the Hartford Board of Education authorize the superintendent to execute a contract with CT Rise for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $190,000 ending June 30th, 2026. Do I have a motion? >> So move. >> Second.

106>> All right. I'm going to throw it to Dr. Arya Colburn, executive director of instruction and student support. >> Good evening. Morning. >> Uh good evening, Superintendent Dr. Tanzo. Um to board members and madame chair. Um we reviewed um the information at the community committee of the whole. And so at this time, we're just going to give a brief overview, but we do have members from um Weaver and also Buckley to speak to some of the um pieces that were brought up at the committee of the whole. So I'm going to turn it over to Liliana to give a very brief overview. Good evening board members, superintendent. Brief overview of the our contract with uh excuse me CT Rise and Harford public schools. Again, the purpose of this contract um is to implement strategies for

107increasing high school state accountability for uh measures for our grade nine students and post-secary work. And that work is um with a focus on coaching and strategic support, professional learning and continued access to the rise data um for our school district and our partners. And now I will turn it over to our Buckley and Weaver staff who will focus on the impact of the work. Good evening. My name is Brooke Lefrener and I am the administrator who oversees the freshman academy at Buckley High School. I'd like to explain the impact that Rise has had directly on our school community through some numbers. Six. This is the number of credits a student needs to acquire in Hartford Public Schools to move from 9th grade to 10th grade. 56. This was the percentage of nth graders on

108track to move from 10th to move to 10th grade the year I started at Buckley. That means that 44% of our students were going to be repeating 9th grade. Studies show that students who complete nth grade in one year are 91% more likely to graduate high school in four years than their peers. While those who take more than one year to graduate or to complete nth grade have only a 35% chance of graduating high school at all. Seven. This is the number of years that I have been working directly with RISE on the creation, implementation, and innovation of the freshman academy in Hartford Public High School and Buckley High School and Weaver High School. 85.3. This is the percentage of students at Buckley who ended this past school year on track to move from 9th

109to 10th grade. 29. This is the percentage increase in Buckley's High School's on-track rate in the seven years I've been working with RISE. Our team's work with this organization has significantly impacted the way that we plan, implement, and analyze our nth grade approach. We use data and protocols from the RISE hub to make informed decisions that are rooted in best practices brought to us by RISE and their partner districts. 93. This is the percentage of Buckley Freshman Academy staff who reported that they were happy with their experiences in such things as data team meetings, on-track conferences, and district collectives, all hallmark practices of Rise district schools. Arguably the most important and impressive number, 400. This is the number of families who came to Buckley's family on track conferences last year alone. An idea born from

110our partnership with RISE, planned during my monthly coaching meetings and refined through their participation in the events. They are not just an organization who meets and monitors our data. They are collection of professionals who are invested in our students success. They show up when it counts. Coming to grade level team meetings, collectively pooling district resources to grow our depth and participating side by side with us to learn and provide feedback. To say that this organization has transformed my work as an educator and leader would be shortselling the level of impact they have had on my time in Hartford. Their influence has enhanced the experiences of our students, staff, and families. Our graduation rate at Buckley has increased year-over-year in large part because more of our freshmen are able to successfully move through their high school

111experience in four years. Our staff retention rate is at level as a at a level unheard of in most urban high schools. and their satisfaction is directly related to the meaningful experiences they continue to have as professionals with this organization. Our families have transformed into active advocates for their students learning, utilizing data and tools pulled directly from our partnership with RISE to better understand what their children should know and be able to do and how to support them to achieve this. I sincerely hope that all members of the board of education get the opportunity to see these experiences in action as I can attest that they are the undercurrent to so many of the amazing things happening at Buckley High School. Thank you. [Music] Good evening, uh, Superintendent, uh, Townsville. Good seeing you, uh, this

112afternoon at the welcome back bash for Harvard public schools board chair, Hockenhole, uh, members of the board of education. Uh, shout out to H.B.CU grads, went to Northfor State University, so it's good to see you up there. Uh, I'm assistant principal at Weaver High School. Uh in addition to that, I am the uh state representative for the seventh district, which includes Weaver High School as well. Uh so in the 30 years that I've been with Harford Public Schools, which I'll be celebrating next year, uh it's fair to say that I've seen a lot of partners and programs come through uh Harford Public Schools, as well as superintendents, right? Uh I think you may be my 15th, not counting, though. Hopefully the last. Um uh when I when I started my tenure um as assistant principal

113uh the data that we had for our our ninth graders uh was not good at all. Uh only about 62% of our students were metriculating uh to 10th grade. Uh and so that was not a good experience. Uh and many of the folks on the board right now can attest to some of the struggles that we we've had. Uh and so the the challenge uh was immense. Uh but I must say the the partnership with CT RISE uh has truly been a catalyst of what we needed at uh at Weaver High School. Uh it provided us with the expertise and resources to deeply analyze data. Uh transforming a daunting problem of of chronic absenteeism, our on-track rate uh to be able to strategic plan around those issues. um almost immediately we saw a collective improvement

114in on on track right rate uh excuse me rates rising from about 62% to 72%. And so that 10 uh% increase has truly uh transformed the lives of so many of our students. So much so that uh this past June we saw the largest uh Weaver High School graduating class in the last 25 years. And that goes to the work of the partners that we had both with not only CT rise and I I I didn't know that RADCT was gonna be here today uh but just to give them a shout out as well just providing those those enhanced opportunities uh that we need so much for our students because oftent times we talk about an achievement gap uh but but really it's the opportunity gap making sure that our students have access and opportunity

115to everything uh that so many other students uh beyond the borders of of of Harford have uh and so we also saw a a decrease in our chronic absenteeism rate. We when I about 5 years ago it was at 78%. That means 78% of our students were chronically absent. Um uh that number has dropped to about 65%. We still have a long way to go. No question about it. But we see though that movement in the right direction which is so uh so important. Uh but I think one of the most appealing and attractive aspects of our work with uh CT rise has been the structure around uh and I think Brook Brooke talked about it a little bit uh on track conferences and these are the conferences that we have with students uh every

116marking period where two weeks before the marking period end uh uh they meet individually with a staff member uh at our school and have a deep conversation about what their progress is and uh not only not only from a academic perspective and I know uh the superintendent has talked about this but from a seal perspective as well just how they're feeling about the space that we call school and and wanting to make sure that it's the most welcoming place for them so that can they can just feel better about coming uh each day. Uh and so these onra conferences uh it's a ninth grade phenomena but at Weaver High School we actually do it for each grade level and it has borne tremendous results just helping students understand what their daily progress is and that

117doesn't happen uh without the the knowledge and skill of the folks from CT rise just bringing the innovation uh because it it's it's it's one thing for a school to try to take on something like this but we have so many things that we have to do and we're pulled in so many different directions but when you have an or organization that is targeted specifically at a group of students who we know that ninth grade is the differencemaker and if we can change their their life trajectory in nth grade we're changing their life forever. Uh and I often tell uh my my team at Weaver that that as a ninth grade team uh we're not just about educating, we're about saving lives because that's the difference uh especially in the communities that we live and

118serve in. That's the difference between uh life and death for many of our students and the work that we're doing with them is really changing and saving lives. And so thank you and if you guys have any questions for us, I'll be glad to answer. >> Thank you. Thank you all for your presentation. I will turn it over to the board members. Any questions, comments? >> Mr. Miss, >> thank you for all of these very powerful testimonies. Um, hello. Hello. >> I was saying the statistics were really remarkable. um the increase from 54% to I wrote down 85.3% um on 9th grade on track. Um you mentioned that now at Weaver we're doing this not just for 9th graders the on-track conferences and we're doing that for every grade level so 10th and 11th graders

119as well um and 12th grade. uh is uh CT rise involved in that process as well with providing the data or has the school sort of adopted that model and developed its own um framework. >> So, so one of the things that they provide us is what is called a data hub and that that information is for all grade levels. Uh but one of the things that wasn't mentioned is their work around uh college and career and the support of our students metriculating on to college and the the emphasis that they placed on that in the last couple of years to ensure that our students are not only graduating but also going on to college. And so that's been extremely helpful working with our school counseling team and we have one of our school counselors

120here with us today. And so that's been extremely beneficial. But it's at each grade level. Uh that's just that's one of the innovations that that we talk about right this like when folks are focused on this work specifically it's really important uh that we take what they give us learn from it uh improve on it and also adapt to different areas but that innovation happens when people are laser-like focused on this issue which we know is so critical to our students success. >> Thank you. Follow-up question. Um that that's great to hear. I was wondering if that's why this is a more general question just from your, you know, perspective as an educator. You don't do you have any insight as to why 9th grade is so critical? Like if you can keep nth graders

121on track, they're 91% more likely to graduate versus I think it was 24% the other percentage was. Um why is that such a critical year? Um and also if you can talk about the quality of the education as more kids are moving through and graduating. Are you also seeing that they're graduating and more prepared for what's after graduation? >> Yeah, that's that's a great question. And so we know that just that from a maturity uh and development developmental perspective that that's that critical juncture when when you're transitioning to becoming a from a pre-teen to a teen uh and just so many things going on with you developmentally, emotionally, but also educationally. Uh but what we also saw this this past year and and what we've seen over year over year from our perspective is just

122an increase in terms of SAT performance, college growing rate. All these things are improving student outcomes at Weaver High School. uh we we had doubledigit gains in math scores and that's just a result of the work that uh the teachers and staff are doing at Weaver High School, but it's also about the partnerships and making sure that students have access to different opportunities and exposed to as much as possible. Uh and so that's been critical for our development and and more importantly student success. I hope I answered your question. Okay. Thank you, >> Mr. Taylor. Um, yeah, it's it's powerful to hear the the testimonies of the value of this work. Um, and I'm trying to figure out how to frame some of my thoughts as a question. I think I've got it. Um, I

123wonder the work that you've described speaks for itself, right? It's it's such valuable um, educational work. Could you speak specifically to the value in your experience of this being provided by CT RISE as opposed to um you know the other various professional development initiatives that that the district implements like like is there is there something in your experience >> um beyond and and this is nothing personal about the people themselves you know I I I completely you know trust their expertise and their um abilities. What I'm trying to get at is our um partnership with a nonprofit organization for um work that is very much in the bread and butter of teaching and learning that we you know have educators who whose job it is who are well trained to do this work and administrators

124who are well positioned to lead this kind of work. Can you speak to the value of this being done by a nonprofit organization as opposed to a homegrown sort of this is how we do business here at Harper Public Schools? Um, so as I mentioned, I've been working with CT RISE for the last seven years. Um, CG RES was brought in by the Bar Foundation when we started looking at freshman academy data and recognized that there was such a significant um, opportunity for us to realign some of the various resources that we have so that our freshmen could create a comprehensive experience that they weren't being lost in the process. Um, and the Bar Foundation really their their decision on bringing CT RISE was because that they had an impeccable uh reputation within Connecticut. Since

125that in the last seven years, they've expanded to six other states. And I think that that really speaks to what they bring to the table. It's not just um, you know, an organization that is happy with where they are. They are constantly innovating um, and improving. And I think it really it speaks to the the people that work there that they are currently um you know trying to expand and think of new ways to improve those experiences for our students. In terms of sustainability um you know Josh and I were having this conversation yesterday. I'm the only administrator who's worked with CT RISE for seven years. There is no one else who was there at the inception who is currently here. And so I think that as Hartford tackles retention and making uh Hartford a

126place that everyone wants to work and continue to work at, that may be a capacity building that we get to. Um but currently with turnover, it becomes increasingly more difficult to uh maintain some of those programs. And so having an organization that's steadfast in leading that work I think really benefits the school communities because you have experts that come to the table year after year no matter who is sitting around the table for them to deliver the message to. And just to piggyback on what Brook said, uh, in terms of the the network that they've created, uh, for not only schools here in Connecticut, but in the six other states and having that ability to collaborate and talk about the the challenges uh, and barriers that they may be facing and getting innovative ideas from

127them. I'm not sure if that's possible if uh, if, for example, I'm on an island in a silo by myself trying to figure this out. I think that network of collaboration uh that they've set the stage for is has been truly impactful for for all of us. >> If if I may just respond, um thank you for for that um that perspective. Um, I think I I'm yearning for a school system where um those barriers to that feeling of efficacy in your in your role is not something that we need to rely on outside entities, right? That that's just kind of like how public schools work in this country or this state or this city. Um, and although it although I am of two minds when decisions like this one come before me of of

128do I do I like really vote against something that is clearly benefiting us um and and the educators that that work with the partners in CT RISE. Um, I am also uh wondering if we're not reliant in some way on that structure and could we figure out something that um would maybe be a key to unlock some uh better retention in the district if if this wasn't something that was a particular program that we needed funding from other outside sources to, you know, it kind of perpetuates itself. And I'm also sort of somewhat skeptical of the growth model of an organization that is creating um opportun these kind of valuable opportunities through funding streams that um are coming from all sorts of places. So um a long-winded way to say um that I I am

129of of two minds about uh this kind of contract. In contrast briefly to the previous contract where I feel like uh uh readyct is is more so operating as as the executive director mentioned at an intersection between two very different fields of the career world and the K12 world. this is so in the wheelhouse of the K12 world and is the bread and butter of what educators do and administrators do. Um, and so I maybe I'm just more sort of protective over it and and I'm yearning for a system where people are free to do the the work that really changes um lives for students and and that is just part of how the system works on its own. Thank you. >> Um, a quick question. Um I what is the um as a a

130student of Weaver who also really struggle with chronic absenteeism for the many reasons that our young people experience today, right? Whether that be sickness, whether that be family dynamics, whether that be hunger or lack of clothing or lack of clean clothing, right? Like there's all these. So it's important to me and as somebody who almost barely made it out, right? Dr. Shrinker had a call and be like, "Are you did you do summer school?" Right? And that was a big deal to have supportive adults to make sure that I did that and that I finished. And then the same thing happened in college where I was new to college and I did not know how college worked. I remember my first thesis class and I'm like what is a thesis you know and part of

131that process was I wasn't able to go to upperbound program like some of my other uh student my colleagues did one of my some of my really good friends were able to go and so that left me um in a way having to fend for myself in many ways right so it's for me chronic absentism is not just about not being in the building right it's a it's acknowledging all the different things that prevent you from getting in the building from learning when you're in the building and even like learning like going back to the ninth grade it's It's a brand new system, a brand new school, a brand new way of being. Same thing with college. Um, so I am uh excited to to see some of the improvements and I know we have

132a definitely a long way to go. Um, what is we've seen what's already happened. What do you project uh in the next coming year based on what you already know about how this can improve chronic absentism as where we stand today? Like what can we project from what we know? Right. I know we might not have the right answer, but from what we know. >> Sure. So Josh mentioned uh Weaver's chronic absenteeism reduction rates. uh Buckley last year to this year also saw a 10% decrease in our chronic absenteeism rates and I will say that um you know we have an amazing uh attendance team in district but um I know a lot of my coaching experiences this year were sort of taking a bird's eye lens at um Rise created a heat map where

133you could see um certain days which which days had the best attendance for 9th graders which days had the worst and then we would discuss like what happened on those days go back in the calendar. Was it an incentive that kids were really motivated to show up for? Was it that it was the half day before break and so we need to have something that's more interesting for them and uh you know meaningful so that they come to the building and and want to participate and you get so in the weeds on a daily basis that some of that stuff is really really hard to sort of take a step back and look at. Um and so you know our freshman class this year our um ADA was 84.5%. Which is one of the highest

134it was the highest of our of our four grade levels. Um and it is directly contributed to the relationships that the freshman academy staff are building with these students because of the opportunities that we're we're providing. Um you know Josh mentioned we were rolling things up. You know Buckley absolutely the same thing. And so I think it really uh they are providing the tools and the data analysis that we don't have the capacity to do in the midst of our day-to-day work that then allows us to make strategic decisions based on that data to improve year-over-year. So you know I lead the ACE work at Buckley. Our goal this year will be to uh decrease our chronic absenteeism by another 8%. And you know utilizing that data we can make informed decisions incrementally to then

135hopefully adjust for those numbers. >> And just just to add a little bit uh to that um and we talked about on track conferences and we talked about talk about uh the academic progress students we're also just asking them what would make you come to school. Uh and so uh one of the things some of the things that our students told us about just get providing more opportunities for us to have a job get a skill get get trained in something. And so this past year we actually developed a program called win where we actually provided students with credentiing programs. So uh they were able to take phabbotomy CNA uh droning uh a host of being a lifeguard. Actually we had one student became a lifeguard as a result of the program. And so we

136we were able to provide a host of opportunities for our students to engage uh not only with the academic side but also thinking about their future and what that could be for them. And so this this work and I understand uh and appreciate uh what the board member had to say in terms of yes all these things should be happening within the school. Um uh definitely I I guess we could all agree with that but at this moment uh in time that we're in right now uh the the support of a community right and that includes our nonprofits uh those who are have special are specialists in these areas is so critical to moving us forward. And yes, at some point we need to get to where we are doing we're self-sufficient uh and doing

137those things ourselves. But at this juncture right now we're still moving in that direction and we still need all hands on deck because of the 65% chronic absentism rate. We still have uh we still have uh too many of our students who are not metriculated on track. And so yes, building that capacity is absolutely something that we want to continue to do. Uh but we're not there yet. But hopefully uh this time five years from now uh we'll be there where we can say you know what uh they can hand it off to us and we're in a great place to do this work ourselves. But at this point I think it's important that they remain our partner. >> Mr. Did you have your hand up? >> I did. >> Go ahead. >> Um hello

138there. Um, when I was reaching out to people earlier uh for more information on this, I talked to someone who works at Harford High and they said the dashboard itself would is so useful that it covers the cost of the entire contract for all four schools. Um, can you talk and I know you mentioned the data hub, I imagine that's sort of the same thing, but if you can talk about what makes that so special and what makes that so important, I'd really appreciate some clarity. >> Yeah. Um, so you know, Josh mentioned ontrack conferences and I had mentioned um we rolled that out um to families. So instead of parent teacher conferences where we had two parents show up last year, um this year we had 400 families and the dates, the times, none

139none of that changed. What did change is we utilize the data in the hub. You can print out what's called a student profile. And so on that quick snapshot, it's not a report card where you get grades and uh a comment and the number of days absent. Um the snapshot is the grades for the students along with um their attendance, their behaviors of concern, um the credit accumulation. So I'm just thinking >> uh and their on-track progress. And so within that piece of data, when families came, when students come to OnTrack conferences, we sit down. The first thing we do is review the student profile. We aren't just interested in what you look like on paper, what the grades that you have are. We want to look at you as a holistic student. Um the

140second component of that is to uh then collect data for um you know, further use through Google forms. So we're asking them like why do you want to come to school? What makes you light up inside? how do you want to contribute to our school community? That sort of thing. And all of that information is garnered from the hub. We can utilize tags to identify certain students. So, if we want to track a small cohort of students for specific interventions that we're attempting to try, to date, Hartford doesn't have the tools to allow us to do that. Um, but the hub does. And so it is an invaluable tool that really uh takes data collection and analysis to a level that uh looks at students as people not just numbers. Oh, >> would you like

141to see that? >> No, I was just >> um yeah, they do they also do surveys and that's tracked through the hub. Um because as you know, you know, historically we don't get a ton of survey participation unfortunately from students, staff, families for whatever reason. Um, and so they uh issue their own survey through the hub that we can then track that allows us to see not only the responses but who has responded, who hasn't. And then again, it's a follow-up conversation like what's going on that this isn't even valuable. You don't want to participate and give us your voice. Again, it just speaks to us being able to meet students where they are so that we can service them on a complete level rather than just worrying about the grades and if they're passing

142or not. >> Thank you, >> Mr. Walker. and then misfortune. >> Yeah. Thank you, chair. Um I I want to focus on capacity building. Um I'm not questioning the tool. The tool is great and and we'll fund it. Um but um as administrator, you talked about being involved with this sec seven years. And so when you got started with this, the students currently in your program were in first and second grade. And so we funded second grade to to you. And what I'm hearing is we're delivering students to you who are basically almost drowning in ninth grade. And so what I'm and while this totally gets you through that moment, what I would ask is somehow we have some way to stand down to begin to understand those of us who are funding one through

143nine and we fund a lot of programs to reduce aphanteism. What are we missing? Because what I'm believing that somehow from 2 to 9th grade we aren't closing that gap. Okay. And so what to get what I'm really asking is is it the possibility for us to do some kind of standown where we can take the time for everyone to get smarter about where the gaps really are and they probably aren't in ninth grade but we can understand it and see it then maybe we can really act on it because right now what I'm feeling like is I'm just funding this the sustaining this program which is totally needed but I'm not getting any smarter or not really providing any other supports so that you can imagine five years from now that pool won't be

144as large of struggling students and potentially then we do more than just you know get them over the fence >> and it's an excellent point I mean being proactive as opposed to reactive I think is is the goal of of everyone um one of the things that we've done this year because uh the summer bridge program has been cut from the budget. Um we during the school year pushed into the eighth grade classrooms in um Burr so that our staff could start to meet those students. We could start to bridge the gap really early so that um we attract more nth graders to come into the building. They know us. They're familiar with us. They see the expectations. It would be amazing to be able to start that in second grade. You know, have high

145school students go and visit like this is what high school is about. this is what it looks like to undertake a project like that would be incredible but that that would be a huge undertaking >> can I just add something of course so >> so one of the things that I will add um to your question some of the work that we're doing um right now is getting at exactly what you said so really thinking about how do we engage students in the college conversation early on we don't have to wait till 9th grade to begin talking about you know what do you want to do post-secary. And so our work really centers around looking at what's happening at the middle school level. And so we have for the upcoming year built stronger partnerships especially

146within our community schools. And so at sixth grade, seventh, and eighth grade, we do have our curriculum really focusing on that college and career readiness through some of the programs that we already have. And at one of our actually at MD Fox, um because they're a community school, they actually are in conversation with Buckley to build that um bridge for our school. And so we are thinking about how do we start that conversation early on so that we don't have the heavy lift in nth grade. This also gets to your point about the capacity building because we do know that the high schools have a heavy lift and we want to make sure that when we're thinking about success we are thinking about when that student first enters school the conversations we have about who

147do you want to be? Um and so we can't wait till nth grade. So that work is already having um happening and we do have a plan in place. >> Okay. Um quick followup chair. So I think two points I took from this one. Um what the administrator said the bridge program was cut. Part of what I want to hear as board member is we don't hear the impact. And at times I'm okay to hear I know we had to cut it but someone needs to tell us cutting that is going to hurt this >> because if we can get that on our radar screen then we can be intentional about oh okay let's restore that or find something else to supplement that so you don't lose ground and um and to what um edsl

148is saying um it's um I talked to a high school student high school teacher did a report okay and she did her own analysis of our own students. Um, there were math students that just got over the hump and what she found is in the next year they were failing again because even though they got over the hump, she found that they always had they had skill gaps >> that showed up in the next year. And so one of the things I'm writing us to do is to really be honest about students in their skill gaps because what I'm saying I'm totally willing to let's fund interventions in elementary and middle school grades to begin to fill some skill gaps. Identify kids who need them and really let's do it. So when they get to

149because my sense is the skills students obtain that's stuff you can't ever take away. And so I I I want to invite us to really let us know where we can really do that work for you as you're finding out these opportunities. Please. Thank you. >> M for >> a lot of our comments are the parts that really are hard uh as a board member because we're spending so much time and energy just analyzing and assessing when really if we just had more resources and better funding and more funding we could do more for all of our students across all grade levels. Um, so, so that's always hard to to hear during these very thoughtful conversations because really fundamentally what's lacking is resources. Everybody's trying to do their best and put resources where we can,

150but there's just not enough to go around. Um, but what I have heard from all of you is that CT rise really or ready Connecticut rather, sorry. Um, it is CT sorry >> the same thing. it. Thank you. Um, it it's converting raw data into knowledge, actionable knowledge that makes you make smarter decisions so that with the limited resources that we have, we're educating as many students as we can and as best as we can. And I think that's meaningful. In an ideal world, this would not be needed because all students would be coming in already at grade level getting all the support. But this is just the reality that we're in. So, I want to acknowledge that. Um, and as I was thinking about why I found the numbers impressive, I think the backdrop

151of my mind was knowing that there are such high vacancies at both Buckley and Weaver um, teacher vacancies um, and some turnover. I think at one point I knew there were only two math teachers at Weaver and I heard that math scores went up with just two math teachers for all these students. So, if you could speak to a little bit doing the hard work, but also how that lack of funding and the vacancies and the turnover is making that harder. Um, and if you know, just so the public can hear and see and we can know how to better support you as well. >> So, just a just a little bit of a correction. So, the year that we had two math teachers, our SAT rate was about 2%. Uh this past year we

152were fully capitalized with our math teachers and we boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boo boosted that number to 14%. And so is actually the opposite that we had we had the the the requisite number of teachers to support our students. Uh and so that's what that's what was critical to moving us forward uh this past this past year. So we saw some of our best numbers because we had relatively few fewer vacancies than we've had in the past. Uh and so knock on wood, we have uh so we're hoping to start tomorrow with uh fully capitalized as far as our staff is concerned. Uh have a couple of interviews and so hopefully we hit the ground running. But yes, uh two

153years ago uh it was very dire uh in terms of math. Last year uh we were fully capitalized and that's when we saw a significant increase in our math scores uh uh this past this past year. Thank you for clarifying because that number really stood out to me. I'm thinking so few teachers yet the scores are going up. What is the quality and are students again not just getting over the hurdles? >> Um >> but again that that speaks to it right like all of the hard work >> if you don't have the staff to teach the students and the support you can't educate kids without teachers. So, thank you for for clarifying. Any other questions, comments? I'll keep it brief. I won't repeat anything anyone said because I agree with most of it, but

154I was terrified. I had a child coming from 8th grade to 9th grade and one of the schools mentioned in this contract. So I it's is more of a thank you um from me because I was like she she's going to get lost. Um she's not even though I know we almost got through the night without mentioning monastery but she came from monastery environment which they say that it looks from the outside it looks like they're being coddled but they're actually being prepared to be super independent. But I knew that's what they were saying, but I just was not like believing it cuz I'm like cuz the care that she came from and I was like they going to swallow up ninth grade. So I was um afraid but she did end up being on

155track and through all the um supports and all that we've discussed tonight. So um from a parent is very appreciated. >> Yeah, Mr. Um I think it's very clear the the benefits that we are are we see from CT rise from Connecticut Rice CT rice. Um I would just hope um cuz I'm hearing that we're rolling it up amongst all the grades um both at Weaver and Buckley. I hope we're doing the same at Canella and Hartford High. And I would also um put it to us as a district, the lessons learned um that we're seeing from the benefits um of the dashboard and so forth that we are trying to implement across all of our high schools cuz Weaver, Canella, um Harford High and Buckley are not the only ones with chronic absenteeism or

156facing the same issues at the nth grade level in terms of our kids um you know um moving on into um higher education. So I would hope that um those CT rises at these um four high schools that we are looking at some of these lessons learned and trying to implement them across the board. That's just my comment. So um I that's a testament to CT rise. So I congratulate you guys. Thanks. >> Thank you. All right. Seeing no other hands. Okay. The motion on the floor is that the Hartford Board of Education authorize the superintendent to execute a contract with CT Rise for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $190,000 ending June 30th, 2026. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Nays. >> Nay. >> Abstensions. All

157right. The eyes have it. The motion moves. Thank you all for your presentations tonight. It was great to see you all. Appreciate you. All right. Item 4.5, contract approval language line. Motion that the Hartford Board of Education authorize the superintendent to execute a contract with language line for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $140,000 ending June 30th, 2026. Do I have a motion? >> So move. >> Second. >> All right. Thank you. Um, I will now pass it to Miss Janelle Hooker, our executive director of strategic partnerships and fund development. The floor is yours. >> Good evening, everyone. Um, so I'm here with you today to talk about our language line contract renewal. um where due to our district having over 80 different languages that we support and the fact that we

158have a commitment to ensuring that out of our parents and caregivers um are able to meaningful participate in their children's education. We have uh a tool that we partner with language line to be able to provide um telephone interpretation services at all of our schools. Um, I did hear at our previous meeting um some areas of interest around getting some information around in-person translation and what would be the opportunities for something like that for our district. Um, I'm here to share that um while we would love to be able to support that, the financial um reality of doing in-person translation is as follows. So, our district does have um approximately 3,000 IEP um uh students or that we have in place at this time. We're 18 or approximately 18 or 19% of that are um

159which is 18 or 19% of our total population is really what I wanted to say. And then approximately 25% of the 3,000 IEPs are the ones that would need translation services. So that bring us to 750 IEPs, right? Um we do have an approximately of 35 to 50 PPTs that we do per day. Inperson translation has a cost of $135 per hour and there is a minimum of two hours for us to be able to provide that service. Um, so when you think about that $135 per hour for the two hours, we're actually talking about $270 um, dollars for that particular hour that we want to have for a PPT. And if we really go with our lower number of 35 um, in person that we would do on a daily basis at the district,

160we're looking at uh, 5,400 for the month. And that is me just talking about a school, right? So we really need to think through from a financial constraint. Is this something that we can really afford at the time language line with the ser with the fees that they charge us? We are able to provide that service to every single one of our schools. We don't need to wait to schedule the phone call. We're inperson translation. if we're bringing in, let's just say, Swahili, or if we're bringing in one of these um exotic languages that we probably don't have someone right there and then, but we need to schedule a PPT, it may impact our ability to legally perform those services for those students within a timely manner. So if we think through that way is

161why um bringing back to your attention that I believe that language line at this time is the better option for our district for our students to be able to really get the services that they need their parents to be um educated on what is happening within their education and really be able to have an opportunity to have a meaningful interaction. What I'm proposing is for this year to be able to work a little more strategic around surveying not only our parents but also our teachers and individuals at our district that are accessing the survey the service to be able to see any areas of growth or changes that we may want to revisit for our following school year. Um I did do a s a study last year when we were thinking through that contract

162and was able to kind of assess four different organization and this one still came under the rate um that the other organizations were offering and this year it did it as well. Um so I am vigilant um just keeping in mind that we definitely need the service for our families but also looking at where our financial constraints are and that's the reason why having language line which is available 247 which offers over 240 languages which um has increased their um hiring of individuals particularly I can speak to Haitian Creole because of the increase in that particular population to be able to support translation. Um as well as um they do have as part of the contract that we would have access is video um option and I think that would be an excellent resource particularly

163for our um families that are um hearing or speech impair as an opportunity to really be able to be a part of um their PPTs in a meaningful way as an option with a similar rate. Um so at this point I am bringing back language line as the viable resource for us to look at as a district um because it's serving what we need at the time. It keeps in mind our financial constraints but it also ensure that we have access to um over our 240 languages to be able to support the services that our families need. I do have with me online uh Mr. Matthews from Language Line. should you have any additional questions that you would want us to um provide information and at this time I am turning it back over to

164um chairperson. >> Thanks Miss Hooker. Uh any questions comments? Uh I'll start with Miss Deller and then go back around. >> Okay, Mr. Walker. Okay. >> So, um, thank you, chair, and thank you, uh, first vice chair. So, um, executive director Hooker, I want to clarify. I think there was conversation about in person and, um, it wasn't to me as much as I I wanted language lines, provides inperson um, um, situations. What I've heard and experience is parents may want an in-person um translator and they're often among staff, right? Um someone who can provide that kind of translation service. Now, occasionally that staff is prevented from going because some principal may say, "Oh, we got language line." What I guess I'm asking in terms of the modification of policy is because there's really value to

165have a personal person who understands jargon and lingo and PBT process that administrators may be more liberal in saying if a parent can request a in-person translator that's available or we can arrange they can be available. Let the administrator do so because it's about money. It's one about money saving and it and it better serves the parent to have a in-person translator when it's available and not just language line. And so I just want that to be understand more of a policy shift. Um, and my followup is because of that, the only thing I would offer the language line if if where that's used, if there's ways where we could feed the language line staff more information about the PPT process, technical terms, and so they can get more familiar with all of that lingo.

166So, if they're going to provide language line support, it's just more effective because we fed them a lot of the background information for how that works. because what's often needed is more than just the language translation. That person really needs to understand the process of what's really happening to be of service to the parent. So, um I do know that currently our schools have had a practice of pulling in staffing that has um either cultural background or knowledge in different languages to support the translation. And I know that at the district we have it as a practice as well. Um because I personally have had um the opportunity to do so at the district level. Um but I would love to be able to pull in Mr. Matthews at this time as I do know

167that his staff um don't only provide the service to our district. This is a national service. Um and I'm sure that he will be able to support an additional answer in this. I would just say that we also need to think through as we're trying to ensure that we have um all of our staff in place, right? When we think through 35 to 50 PPTs per day and then we're looking to schedule them at a different scale and pulling staff or people to support that. What is the impact that that is also having on a day-to-day operation of our schools? Right? So we also need to balance um the day-to-day support to ensure that our students are getting the service that they need. Also the families are getting the service that they need. Which is

168why having an additional tool or resource that our school administrators can access. Not only our school administrators, our front desk at the schools, our security guards when um families come to that front entry point are able to access is something that I'm bringing to our attention to consider as a contract renewal. Um Mr. Matthews. >> Hey Janelle. So we are able to have you provide us with a glossery of terms or any special but our interpreters they are trained for IEP meetings already. So they like you said we're not you know you're not our only clients. We have over 31,000 clients in every industry. Um, all all government, nonprofits, um, you know, private industry. Again, over 30,000 clients. Currently, we do over 65 million interpretations a year. For your school district, we did 12,999 in

169the last year in 41 different languages to include American Sign Language, which you did mention. But if you do have a style guide or glossery that you want to provide to us, we can give that to all of our interpreters who take calls for your account and while they're on the call, they'll be able to reference it. >> Thank you. >> No, Mr. Thank you for um for this information. Um as someone whose parents, you know, don't speak English particularly well, this service, you know, would have been very helpful to them when I was in school. Um, so I think it's great that we offer that and I do understand the constraints of pulling staff that is performing some type of work in the building to now have to stop what they're doing, go translate,

170then go back to their work that that could be disruptive, especially if it's happening um at a high volume. Um, the only thing I I have a question on and some clarification. So, are you saying that we're build for a minimum of two hours for every time we engage with language line regardless of how long a meeting lasts or did I misunderstand that? >> No, the two hours that I spoke was in person translation which would be a separate contract that we would have to do, not necessarily through language line. >> That makes sense because the person has to physically come. So, you have to make it worth their while. >> They're commuting, they're driving, they're pulling to get there. So, they need a minimum of two hours. >> Okay. Thank you. I I was

171concerned that there was just the um virtual one. Okay. Thank you. >> Mr. Taylor, >> I'm glad that you mentioned the the video interpretation. Um, and I I wonder if um it's been a couple years since I was in the district, but um I since I was teaching in the district, I I my my guess is that that is an underutilized option, especially for some of those higher stakes meetings. Um as a teacher, it was great to use the phone to contact parents for for, you know, routine information or or just to exchange um messages that we needed to exchange. uh but for a meeting like a PPT um in the absence of readily available inerson facilitation, I wonder if the video um option could provide some of that extra kind of interpersonal uh presence

172that that could benefit those meetings. And so I hope that since that is a service and you know I did the math, it is it does work out to $90 an hour. So it's not did I do that math correctly? Let's see. 150 a minute. Uh yeah, $90 an hour. So it it it's not that much cheaper than than hiring somebody, but um sometimes those meetings don't go for the entire hour even then. Um although I guess if you were translating, it doubles the length usually. Um I digress. I encourage you to put um make it clear that that is an option for and and encourage its use and get that feedback. I'm glad to hear that we're going to be collecting more user user experience feedback so that we can get better as a

173district at this really important task of making sure that um we're communicating accessibly. >> Noted, >> Mr. Celler. >> Thank you. I just wanted to say a couple of things. Um, with regards to translation and you know language line, our ultimate goal is to communicate is to have effective communication, accurate communication between families and Harvard public schools. Um what I wanted to put out there is that while there is a huge um like this increase in Haitian creole um believe it or not there are certain parts of Haiti where the Crayole is different. So depending on if you come from the north versus the south there is a different there can be a different dialect. So, I'm hoping that um there is some intentionality with the increase of the numbers of Haitian Creole folks who

174are coming um that there's some intentionality with dissecting that. >> Thank you. >> All right. Any other questions? Next question. >> Um this is more of a comment um from the price perspective. You know, it's great that we offer the language option and I think it is a necessity for a lot of families, but given budget constraints, if we want to offer up more video conferences, I would think we want to make it available where it actually adds value because I don't think everyone who's engaging with the school needs a video call because it's I don't know like what double the cost, right? Price-wise, >> close to close to three times the cost. >> Correct. >> If we're able to communicate to parents in a language that they understand, and I know from prior meetings

175that language line said they only hire people native to those countries, not someone who, you know, I took Latin for one year. I'm not going to be someone who's hired to translate into Latin. Um, so I this is an area where we should provide the service but really provide the service at a point where it's effective, not necessarily have to go above and beyond to have an extra person in there physically or have video when it's not adding any value because I I don't see how that adds anything to to that relationship. Noted. All right. Anyone else? All right. Seeing no hands, the motion on the floor is that the Hartford Board of Education authorized the superintendent to execute a contract with language line for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $140,000

176ending June 30th, 2026. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Nays abstensions. The eyes have it. The motion moves. Thank you so much, Miss Hooker. and thank you um for being online from language line as well. All right, item 4.6, contract amendment to P school. Motion that the Harford Board of Education authorize the superintendent to amend the contract with P school for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $121,000 ending June 30th, 2026. Do I have a motion? >> So move. >> Second. >> All right. Thank you. Uh, Miss Richard, our CFO, the floor is yours. >> Good evening. Uh, so this is a contract amendment for P school to add the budget software. All of you. So, really quick overview. I know we talked about it in committee.

177This is moving us from using multiple different spreadsheets to build our budget to one budget software. Uh, it's in line with the public works recommendation from the state inquiry to choose a budget software that works for all users. Um, and is aligned to our strategic plan goal of making our finances more transparent and efficient. Um, it's about $120,000. I promise we will save that in staff time and in identifying budget savings. It's $120,000 to manage our $450 million budget. Um, one of the questions that was asked in committee was what other tools we considered that was sent out to the board from Christina. There's about seven other tools. One of them is actually Google Sheets, which is what we've been using. Um, and all of you performed the best across all the different criteria. So

178things like user friendliness, integration to munice, having access to our data, grants management, which was a huge area identified in the public works report. Um, it also produces the budget book, which we're really excited about that will make things a lot more efficient for getting information to you all. Um, and it's actually the only tool out there that only focuses on K12 systems. So there's lots of tools that focus on different types of organizations. This is the only one focused just on public K12 systems. Um, so I'm going to leave it at that. I have Yamir Sto with us. She's our amazing budget director. I don't think anyone is more excited than her about this tool. And then we also have Corey Edmonds from Power School all of you on the line for questions. >>

179I am I am very excited that we're gonna explore um the new platform. We have used all of you in the past and after the demonstration u from all of you it's very promising. I am looking very forward to using it to avoid any errors and even starting from probably the possibility of doing budget allocations in the in the platform uh with a uh an approval workflow. So I am very excited. >> Thank you both very much. I will open it up to board members. Any questions, comments? Mr. Mills. Hello there. Uh, I just want to say that as someone who has transitioned from budget softwares to other budget softwares, I can understand exactly how meaningful this is for you guys. Uh, so I just want to say congratulations on finding one. Uh, because I

180have spent many, many, many hours uh, doing the budget book for the city of Hartford. So, you have my sympathy. >> Any other questions, comments? All right. Seeing none, the motion on the floor is that the Hartford Board of Education authorize the superintendent to amend the contract with Power School for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $121,000 ending June 30th, 2026. All those in favor signify by saying I >> Naz. Abstension. >> Abstain. >> All right. Thank you. The eyes have it. The motion moves. Thank you both very much and thanks for hanging out with us for so long so you could do this. appreciate you. >> Christina gave me a cookie, so I'm feeling excellent. >> Don't go away. >> Go help yourself. >> Uh, all right. Item, uh, 4.7, contract

181amendment, a brand new day. Motion that the Harford Board of Education authorized the superintendent to amend the contract with a brand new day for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $21,958.70 ending June 30th, 2026. Do I have a motion? So moved. >> Second. >> Uh Dr. Hoffman, assistant superintendent for special education and pupil services. The floor is yours. >> Thank you. Good evening. >> Thank you. And good evening. The contract for a brand new day was um executed during the 2425 school year and it was reviewed at the policy committee meeting. The purpose of the contract is to fulfill mandated BCBA services outlined in the students individualized education plan or their IEP. The services for the student for the student per the contract were fulfilled. The contract for a brand new day

182was brought to the board in May 22 2025 to be amended to $165,999 because of it exceeded the original contract. $35,959.70 was a total amount exceeded in the May amended board approved contract amount due to additional invoice services, some of which we received late in August. The increase brought the new total amount to the $21,958,000.70. to be proactive to ensure this does not occur moving forward. Um the finance team did reach out to the vendor to asssure that we would not receive any additional invoices for the 2425 school year. A monthly check-in with the accounts payable team to monitor the timely payments of invoices against a board approved contract amount is in place. A standing meeting with CFO Richard and myself um will be in place to review all contracts. A system to ensure if

183changes occur during the PPT process um do not and do not have fiscal implications uh to the existing contract is in place. And there's also um potential to ensure that um we follow up on modifying um a document to ensure that if a student is exited or a service is increased that it's also captured against the board contract. >> Great. Thank you, Dr. Hoffman. I will open it up to the board for questions or comments. Um a question I have two questions, but the first question that I have is um can you go over it again just for public uh viewing? What exactly happened in terms of the invoicing? Like was the invoicing sent late? Uh were they payout late? Like what was the what was the hiccup there? I know there seems to be

184some structures put in place to make sure that doesn't happen again. Can we go over what happened and then reiterate what those structures are to avoid that in the future? Just to be clear. >> Sure. There were additional invoices that were sent um as far as back as November through July and August. So that was the hiccup. Um some systems that we have in place right now moving forward. Um the finance team reached out to the vendor to ensure that there were no additional uh invoices for that particular contract. We've also scheduled a monthly check-in with accounts payable so that there is a checks and balances on the invoices matching the contract. CFO Richard and I will have a standing meeting so that we are monitoring the contracts and invoices coming in for all board

185approved contracts. And we also are working on a system to ensure that if there are changes happening at the PPT that impact the contract, we're then again measuring that piece um in our in our meetings. And one followup, but it's different. It's a different question. Um, I don't know if I don't know if I asked this ne last time, so I want to make sure I asked it this time. Because of the nature of what this is, this contract is about uh sped. Is this the kind of contract that has to go that has to go through a negotiation with the unions? Um, or is that not a thing that happens that has to happen with this contract? Uh, just want to make sure. >> This contract is not for negotiation with the union. It

186has already been approved for the 2526 school year um for a large amount which um we will not exceed. >> Thank you, >> Miss Fortune. Did you have your hand up? >> Okay. All right. Thank you. Uh any other questions, comments? All right. Seeing none, the motion on the floor is that the Hartford Board of Education authorize the superintendent to amend the contract with a brand new day for the term outlined in the contract not to exceed $21,958.70 ending June 30th, 2026. All those in favor signify by saying I >> I. Nays nay. Abstensions. The eyes have it. The motion moves. Thank you both for your presentation. All right, we're moving on to the consent agenda. Uh the consent agenda is full of household items now that we have a new superintendent as well as

187two first readings. Uh item 5.2 approval of authorized signatory for Hartford Public Schools, Dr. Townsel. 5.3 Appointment of the School Building Committee member as required by statute, appointing Dr. Townsel to the Hartford School Building Committee. 5.4 four authorized signatures for the child nutrition programs adding Dr. Townsel as signatory and the following items are first readings that were discussed at the August 11th policy committee and will be discussed again before coming back for second reading to the board meeting and those are 5.5 first reading policy 5141 student health services updated to reflect current practices 5.6 Six first reading policy 5141 student health services as a new policy for the Hartford public schools adapted from the CA model uh notes that the district has had the protocols reflected in its policy in place since 2022 and 5.7

188approval of the minutes from the July 15 2025 meeting. Any comments or questions on the consent agenda? All right. Seeing none, do I have a motion to vote on the consent agenda? >> So move >> second. >> All right. All those in fig all those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Naz abstensions. The eyes have it. Thank you everyone for your attendance tonight. Congratulations Dr. Townsel on your very first meeting in the books. Check. Um the August 19th board of education meeting is adjourned. Thanks for joining us. Good night.