001for good [Music] evening good evening as chairperson of the Hartford board of education I hereby call the meeting to order the meeting of the board of educations March 18th 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 Harford 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 state 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
002make management decisions or solve problems of individuals management is the responsibility of the superintendent the monthly meetings of the board are open to the public they are times when the board conducts its me business of governing the school system in a public area 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 appropriately recorded I may ask for order periodically should noise begin to interfere with our recording capabilities I am pleased you have taken this time to join us this evening we are very
003proud of the school system and thank you for your interest in the Hartford Public Schools this will now be read in Spanish har IND for [Music] thank you uh will now move on to public comment Miss Santiago 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 ATT to attend tonight's board meeting we appreciate you coming out to learn more about Harford public schools and for sharing your thoughts and concerns we have established a protocol to track and respond the 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 follow up is required via the preferred method
004of contact the speaker has indicated on the sign-in sheet we will follow this no contact method of followup for the time being adhering to safety protocols as a reminder you have 3 minutes to speak at the two-minute Mark the bell will ring letting you know that you have 1 minute left at the second Bell please wrap up your comments now this will be read in Spanish for our first public speaker we have quite a few students is ooy Walton is it possible to raise the house lights I think that's just so we can see easier ooy Walton I try Dwayne small if you s good evening members of the board I hope all is well my name is aoy fry I am a current senior and will be an upcoming graduate of the class of
00525 at Capital Preparatory magnet school as part of the graduation Journey i c prep seniors are obligated to create a social justice project that both successfully addresses and raises awareness about a social justice project about a social justice issue within the capital prep school or the Harford Community the issue that my Harford Community the issue that my social justice project addresses is the shortage of nutritious food in schools throughout this project I've been measuring how inadequate School food negatively impacts the academic and recreational success of all sorts of students within lowincome communities in many schools in Hartford there is a shortage of nutritious food and this causes big problems for students when kids don't get enough healthy meals their bodies and Minds don't get the fuel that they need to stay focused and energized throughout
006the to day hunger makes it hard to pay attention in class remember lessons and stay motivated some students even skip school because they feel too tired or sick from not eating properly others may feel embarrassed about not having enough food which can make them avoid school alog together which then creates a local issue and many schools within Harford having a high absenteeism rates as well as substandards academic grades the frequency of adolescent school absentees was significant Aly High 50.2% among food insecure households compared to their peers whose households were food households were food secure 37.8% missing school often leads to falling behind in lessons and getting lower grades over time this creates a cycle where students struggle to catch up and their academic performance suffers without proper nutrition students can't reach their full potential students
007that offer healthy meals give students schools that offer healthy meals give students a better chance to learn grow and succeed most students in capital prep such as myself struggle with being hungry throughout the 8 hour school day the school lunch is undesirable and the portions don't correspond with the ages of the student with the ages of the students nor the amount of learning that the students undergo all high school students are multisport athletes and have some sort of after school activity daily we are forced to go to fast foods restaurants and convenience stores to fuel our bodies and almost every day for the for mandatory late Sports practices and games which is due to limited nutritious options within a walkable distance addressing the shortage of nutritious food in schools is crucial for helping students stay
008focused healthy and successful by providing better meals options schools can support students learning and well-being giving everyone a fair chance to reach their full potential with all that being said want to thank you all for dedicating your time to this meeting that was Mr ooy Walton now Dwayne small good evening Board of Education members and fellow attendees my name is DNE small and I'm a senior at Capital prep as a part of my social justice project I have been examining how misallocated school funding negatively impact students in lowincome communities despite millions of dollars being allocated to education many schools still struggle with low literacy rates limited extracurricular AC opportunities and a lack of proper student support the issue isn't just a lack of funding it's how the money is being spent too often resources are
009directed towards administrative costs rather than directly benefiting students as a result students are left without the academic and developmental support they need to succeed if funding were properly invested in literacy programs specialized Educators and enrich enrichment activities students will have a stronger foundation for Success it's time to ensure that Educational Funding is used where it matters most on students this isn't just about budgets it's about equity and opportunity each student deserves to be properly invested in no matter their zip code thank you [Music] Anthony Barber followed by abgil Rivera first Anthony Barber [Music] be [Music] hi my name is uh Anthony Barber I'm 20 years old I'm I currently live in Harford and I'm a member of M drum line well mol Academy and basically I was uh I used to be uh well basically
010I was very involved with uh music and um and instruments and learning how to learning how to read and play music and I used to do juming when I when when I was in third grade with my uh actually old group and um I was with them all the way up until um my junior year of uh high school and then I was uh pretty much out of druming for like a for about a year and a half have and then I was brought to mag soul and that's where I'm at currently and and I like it it I've I've been in M for almost uh three years now I've uh I've definitely gone I could definitely say I've gone better at at uh playing I've learned a little bit a lot more about uh
011music and uh and how to use music and uh play and read music basically and pretty much my just is a primarily based in Harare where uh Soul J line and overall is pretty good I kind of wish we had a lot more pretty much to do in Harford where constantly move around the project spots and constantly moving around for a lot of locations and and it's kind of it's kind of been tricky since not all of us are from Harford a lot of us are and plenty of other places from Connecticut so pretty much constantly having to move around uh for practice and and a lot of uh other stuff is kind of something that I wish was into the case and we had a lot more uh say in the matter and a
012lot more support very much thank you AB abil Rivera and after abil is Kon bobu Bobs sorry M type if you both can come up my name is Angel Rivera I am 16 years old I go to new High uh I recently moved out to Connecticut not really knowing what I was going to do up here not knowing how I was going to continue with my life um before I used to stay in Florida and I was very badly influenced by some of the people I hung around um I used to do a lot of bad things when I moved to Connecticut and I found magic Soul they really they really changed me in the way that I perceived things and do certain stuff mag Souls really helped me with a lot of my mental
013struggles and uh getting myself out there and pushing out my boundaries like right now how I'm speaking to y'all um so I really would like to thank Herold Ortiz for giving me this opportunity um before I didn't I didn't even think I was going to do drum line ever or any type of drumming with me it was just going outside and feel me Contin with life wherever feel me the wind takes me um when I got into drumming I was like oh I'm not going to get this I'm not going to get that but thanks to our coach Herold Ortiz he was able to teach me a lot of a lot of stuff teach me how to continue with certain things uh help me with School uh and I truly did find a passion for
014drumming um uh so with magic soul nio is like a a second family that I got almost all of us are really close each other and then if we have any sort of be if we squash it out cuz we're we're one you feel me without one or another you feel me we're not going to really get that sound or that feel to the drum line um yeah that's pretty much all I got to say thank you Shaquan Jones and Shaquan will be followed by khil mcnight if you want to make your way forward as [Music] well hi my name is Squan Jones I've been in Magic so for about 3 years since my eighth grade experience I've been a quiet kid actually before I join magic soul I didn't have enough confidence I felt
015really down and like what experiences in my life like the passion of my father it like changed my life it made me like see things in a different way and I didn't want to talk to people like that but then one of my friends that I was really close with told me about magic soul I thought it was something to take my mind off and then after that I joined I wasn't like out of myself C until a year or so I met new people that helped me a lot with everything I never saw myself even drumming before I really just I never really like even saw myself being up here before but like since I got out my I felt more comfortable doing stuff like this because of magic soul and my experiences in
016the past I feel I'm able to talk to people a lot more and do a lot more things do the magic so thank you Kil mcnight hi sorry my hi I'm K mcnight I am 16 years old a sophomore in high school currently attending John J Allison Craig Polaris Center in East Harford and what to say um before magic soul I was quiet you know stuck to myself never really trusted people you know growing up in the place that I grew up at you kind of adapt view you kind of adapt you know this stigma against people and to be frank I I didn't see myself being in Magic Soul either I mean it all started because one day my brother invited me to a practice and ever since that day I fell in love
017like deep spiral into magic soul and it's helped me realize that people aren't so bad you know there are people out here who genuinely care about how you are in your well-being and I found that with magic soul and you know it it's helped me cope a lot more especially with anxiety and stress because once you get to that stage it's just like an adrenaline rush it's unexplainable and it it it's change me in so many ways thank you [Music] M Ward followed by Jeremiah Ashley Keller [Music] uh my name is Miley Ward uh I'm 13 currently attending baton St magnet school and I currently attend magic Soul academy uh before magic soul I was getting in trouble in school um smoking drinking and stuff like that and then magic Soul taught me the discipline
018and like it taught me to like respect myself more cuz once we have the shirt on you like have to be your best self so we can get more performances and get recognized more we travel around Harford and Connecticut and sometimes like out of state uh Magic soul is a very loving drum line once you join you like you come out your show and like you like you could be yourself like an extrovert like no matter what outgoing no matter what uh everybody in the drum line will love you for you you you can trust them with like anything so yeah Jeremiah Ashley Keller um my name is Jeremiah Ashley Keller before magic Soul you know I still had good grades you know I know how to respect people but after I join magic soul
019I learned instrument I learn to be aware of my surroundings to always respect cuz you don't know who is um who's around you and from being in Magic Soul I've met a lot of people had many opportunities uh with magic soul I was able to go you know many places in Connecticut and outside of Connecticut so um favorite performance and we go many places like my favorite performance we go to hoolio Massachusetts for um this St Patrick's Day Parade it's really big there's a lot of fun we get to go everywhere meet people be plac we've never gone before without it Sonic Mias is it Sonic Mahia apologies for typo yeah okay and Sonic will be followed by Sheran Rodney [Music] hello my name is Sonic mikas and I'm currently in my second year of
020college at Yukon University uh and I'm one of the first couple members of magic Soul Academy when it was first started it started in 2021 over zoom and Herold Ortiz was working with a few people teaching them the basics and whatnot and then in 2022 that's when he started having live practices and I've been I've been a part of a drum line since sixth grade as extracurricular and I can say that being a part of a drum line or just something extracurricular like this has not only led to my growth as a musician but also as an individual it was able to teach me or my mentors taught me a lot of different life lessons and one of the few important ones was discipline the way that we apply discipline to our practicing habits we
021can take those and translate them into studying habits or work habits as well because it's the same thing you take your knowledge you reinforce that knowledge and you apply it elsewhere and then another thing that it taught me is leadership skills I've had plenty of opportunities as a part of magic soul to take the group and lead them whether it's during performances and I'm getting everyone ready to go on stage or during practices and I'm there running the routine and getting everyone set up and looking good um another thing and I think this is the most important thing the strum line has given me is outside of all the different things that I've learned is it's given me a community a home a lot of people struggle to find that sense of family but I'm
022sure you can ask anyone on Magic Soul we all feel like family here we all feel like brothers and sisters everyone's mom is our mom and all that type of stuff and that's something that's really rare to find especially in Hartford I feel like a lot of schools don't have that opportunity for kids to go out and find a community or build a community especially one where it pertains to our own individual interests there's not a lot of cultivating creativity and getting people to feel passionate about something and that's why a lot of people end up turning to gangs and gang violence and hurting each other and stuff like that when we can't find a place to call home and a place to build our passions then we turn to we turn to other things
023and I feel like if we can start building that type of community within schools and give people an outlet for whatever it is that they're interested in then that would help to the healing of Hartford Thank You shardon Rodney [Music] um good evening Board of Education members my name is Shon Rodney I'm a senior Capital pre magnet school as part of my senior Capstone project the social justice project or SJP for short I have been addressing the issue of loyaly rates among black students in urban areas through my research and observations I have found that many students particularly eighth graders are not performing at the reading levels necessary for their academic progression these students struggle with basic phological awareness have limited vocabulary and face significant challenges with a reading comprehension this raises a critical question
024how can these students how can these students advance to grade levels without meeting the ly standard required for Success if they are already falling behind now how will they be prepared for high school college or even adulthood without the foundation without the foundational literacy skills they need they they should have developed in early childhood schools are required to to provide intervention programs to support struggling students however despite the requirement there seems to be little evidence of effective intervention taking place in other words students are not receiving the support they need to to reach the appropriate grade level reading standards this is reflected in the district performance index for ELA exam jarts as reported on the on ed.org from 2018 to 2014 the district average performance index stands at 48.9% significantly below the target of 75
025a clear indication that students are not a clear indication that students are underperforming at an alarming rate in a district where general education teachers make up the majority of Faculty I strongly believe that there should be more student support services and specialized education teachers dedicated to assisting different groups of students increasing targeted intervention would help ensure that students receive the support they need to succeed academically if we fail to act students like Alicia Ortiz will graduate without the ability to read and write this is not just an educational issue this is a social justice issue every student deserves opportunity to succeed and liters she is a foundation of that success thank you for your time Jade G hello Board of Education members my name is j goou and I'm a senior at Capital Preparatory magnet
026school as part of my senior Capstone project I am raising awareness about systemic racism and how it affects black students mental health and also the lack of U Mental Health Care students for the students that are affected um throughout my research I have found that many black students stated that they feel pressure to work hard because of stereotypes about their race and that they also feel it is important or very important for their mental health provider to understand these issues a racial issues um constant discrimination correlates with constant stress black students represent about 15% of K through 12 public school students but account for over 30% of suspensions and expulsions um if a society has historically treated a certain racial group as inferior people growing up in the society May unconsciously absorb those biases black
027students are constantly labeled as disruptive or defiant they receive harsher punishments increase disciplinary actions and ultimately they have a school environment that feels unwelcoming and hostile instead of receiving or searching for support many black students push themselves out of classrooms because they feel the stress is too much and they feel unworthy um in 2022 the CDC reported that black students have one of the highest amounts of perceived racisms in classrooms and those who report us also had a higher prevailance of poor mental health the CDC also reported that black students are at a higher risk for depression anxiety and other mental health struggles than their white peers doing my research I found two important things one predominantly black schools especially in Harford don't have enough counselors to support them two most black students are less
028likely to seek help if they feel as if their counselor cannot relate to them school should be a place where all students feel understood regardless of their race black students shouldn't have to feel like they have to work twice as hard just to be seen as equal nor should they have to feel as if their struggles are being dismissed I believe if schools truly want to support their students they need to address these disparities instead of hiding them because black students deserve the same access to education mental health support and opportunities as anyone else thank [Applause] you David Anderson or davine Anderson good afternoon everyone all right so my name is Davin Anderson I'm 17 years old I'm a drummer of magic Soul drum line and I go to Academy of Science innovation in New
029Britain so today I'll be talking to you about my drum line and following up on what everyone said so my drum line is about pushing everyone and getting getting everyone out of their comfort zone bringing PL bringing people places where they haven't been before giving people new experiences so this new generation as you know we love to stay on our phones we love to play games we love to stay inside we don't really get to go outside much so my coach Harold he's been doing this program since 2021 trying to bring everyone out so they can enjoy theirself don't they don't have to be locked up in their house all the time and be on their phone all the time I know the parents don't love it that much but we we as kids that's
030the only thing that's the only um that's the only entertainment we have nowadays cuz as much as much as there's a lot to do outside there's not there's not really if you guys understand that but yeah so we bring this drama we bring us we bring kids places all over the places our biggest per performance was her for Got Talent at busho so that was one we we have been going for a while but there's been a struggle because of funding we don't really have the funds to really support the jump line that much to be traveling because there's not much we can do we do go to performances we get paid but sometimes it's not on us because we need uh different Vans 15 TR 15 passengers your Vans and that's a lot of
031money for us cuz we're just a we we're not just starting but we're still progressing we're trying to get up there and let everyone be known about our program so they can try to come in help them help the community help the kids get out their house give them give them a better life instead of staying inside playing on their phone I'm I was one of the kids who loves to see on my phone I still am and play games but this drum line has brought me out of my comfort zone I wouldn't be here doing this right now if this for if it wasn't for this drum line I would not be here in front of you guys talking about my experiences but only thing is that we could need the help and that's
032pretty much it thank you for [Applause] listening L Torres hi good afternoon sorry um my name is Luc Horus I am one of the parents of one of the magic Soul drum line well B basically they're all my kids um now that that you know I joined the band as well um you know there are pretty good you know they like they've been saying they come out of the comfort zone they learn so many things um you know we Tred to teach them to be responsible timeliness you know and they gone so many places I you know they get praised everywhere um they go you know they have gone to North Carolina um to perform over there um but like Davin has said we do need help with the fundings um it's a lot of
033um you know things that we need you know in getting their uniforms to make them look perable Transportation wise sometimes we need two Vans um to rent them to try to get them to performances um so what we really would you know love is to see if we could get any help for them because we know we try to get these kids not to be getting in trouble out of streets you know and they do that you know they learned as you heard some students were going down the wrong path um hanging out with the wrong people but being in the drum line they learned they learned a lot of things about being with friendship talking to us you know they can't talk to other people you know they come talk to us they talk
034about their problems we try to help them as much as we can um like I said they're a family to us they're my kids um all of them they call me Mom you know but like I said we need the help with the funding um and basically that's all you know like we need um they're they come from different um parts of the Town New Britain East Harford here in Harper so it's all over the place that you know they they're from it's not only a Harper um kids so um and they're from different ages um you know we have my son started when he was 11 years old he 13 now um and we have the little one here you know starting so it's like we try to get as much as kids that
035you know um to join the program so they could have a better experience um and we have people going off to colleges we had a lot of students um one went to Virginia state um he's playing the drums over there so it's something that they're getting something good out of this it's not that they're wasting their time here so we really appreciate if we did get a little bit of help so thank you thank you say byebye Harold Ortiz [Music] hello everyone my name is Harold Ortiz I'm actually the director founder for magic Soul Academy here in Harford as you heard from my students and one parent that I have here before you today um this is a community based program we're an after school program um to correct uh what some of my former
036students told me uh said earlier this program actually started in 2020 during pandemic when everything was um virtually we didn't have any other access so the only access that I had was virtual 2021 is when we were finally able to get indoors and get on drums um this program has led a lot of kids kids that are in DCF kids that the whose parents not paying attention to them or no longer exist in their lives they live with the grandparents they have no resources no help whatsoever this program has uplifted them and gave them something that they never had before something they never thought they would ever uh see um this is uh a show style drum line and dance line group uh we basically bring the HBCU culture everywhere we go which is something
037that we do not have up here unfortunately um just to name some of the places where I've taken these kids thanks to this program um we have done pream halftime shows for the WNBA Connecticut Sun team we have done multiple weddings uh corporate parties we have been on FOX 61 News more than nine times and during events and interviews we have been we were a part of the first group to be a part of the 20123 North Carolina entt homecoming and we represent it very well right now we're on our second year being invited to the hoolio St Patrick's Day Parade which is By Invitation Only and uh we have currently 12 kids thanks to this program we have put 12 kids in college four at Virginia state four at Yukon one at Duke three
038at CCSU uh couple in uh Capital uh Capital Community College and um I can't remember the last one but we do have some kids that are currently seniors and have been accepted to some really great schools as well thanks to this we have no funding and and we could really use your help um it is very difficult for us to get funding Transportation seeing that uh passenger vans AR available often and if they are they're very expensive so we have to go through a third party like turo or something just to make sure that we can get to performances on time and make them I would love to tell you more but unfortunately my time is up um I would love to chat with you all on a personal level if you have the time
039and thank you for your time anelise re Rees an hi oh hello my name is Anna Elis Rees I'm a har Harford born native I graduated from gra great Harford Academy of the Arts I attended Yukon I am working as a behavioral therapist I work with children all day every day when I'm not with babies um I'm with these babies back there uh seeing the growth seeing all the opportunities that Herold and this program has been able to give to these children seeing the social skills seeing how the time management seeing all the responsibilities that they are now starting to realize and accept that they have to do and starting turn into that routine into that pattern to become successful adults is mesmerizing each day and the fact that me Herold and the Drumline moms
040we have here get to do that every every Monday wed day Wednesday rehearsals every performance even down to just having the responsibility of grabbing your strap and grabbing your mallets fixing your shirt and making sure your friend in your peer doesn't drop their mallets it's a blessing I wouldn't see my life any other way I wouldn't want to see these kids' life any other way it's a struggle out here you know it's not safe to be in certain areas these days and education is very important to all of us we wouldn't be here if that wasn't the case if we had more funding to be able to take these kids to do more experiences we could be able to bless not only our current group but other kids with the same opportunities and I hope
041that there is some type of funding some type of way because seeing Harold do it by himself is a lot and I know the parents and I try our best to you know help him out and I know the kids going do so much their children we want to make sure that they get to enjoy themselves but also learn and could enhance their education in the best way possible thank you levie culus [Music] hello board Levy culus um where do where do I begin um thank you Leslie for correcting um the uh issue about you being at the SN program uh because if you was there magic Soul drum line was there and they give an amazing performance um Harold son was in my science classroom at Slade middle and um they're just amazing that
042program and what Harold does with kids from Britain and Harford and East Harford he's taking kids who now never played an instrument and they're playing not just playing they doing that HBCU thing and coming in stepping I'm like holy smokes they do an amazing job but um you know they need help with transportation and storage of of equipment and instruments and everything um so any kind of help would uh greatly be appreciated okay the uh second thing is I'm also affiliated with a group um I know a lot of people know me as some union guy um but actually uh I started coaching basketball in San Bevy Square that's what I really started with as I was a custodian um so we got $35,000 through um um um um um through a grant back in
0432021 to redo the basketball courts at Bev Square SS which still hasn't happened and um we need to find that money so I'm drafting a letter through the Freedom of Information to find out where those funds are because that was four years ago um I'm pulling together Marcus cambi Rick Mahorn and Michael Adams to cuz we're going to make this pop cuz that's where I started you know and I won back-to-back championships I ran Harford elementary basketball long before any of this Union stuff and I wish those Capitol prep kids were here because they were talking about racism but that racism exists at the workplac you know you know we got have a backstory the reason why I ran for Union president and why I became Union president you know racism exists is real in
044the workplace so um so that letter is forthcoming it will be to you the Board of Education it will be to my attorney Bruce R Rubenstein and the representatives of Marcus cambi Rick Mahorn and Michael Adams thank you Lori Minik [Music] good evening Dr Torres Rodriguez and esteemed Board of Education members my name is Lori minck and I have the honor of serving as the Director of Early Childhood for the district one of the truly great roles I think available here tonight I am here to celebrate two exceptional programs that are under my over site first little owl's Early Learning Center it was established in 1997 is located at Hartford High it provides high quality child care that empowers teen mothers to return to school and continue their education after the birth of their child
045due to a variety of challenges Little Owls was temporarily closed during this time and guided by the Visionary leadership of superintendent taures Rodriguez a dedicated team including myself worked tirelessly to reimagine the program together we transformed Little Owls oops into a model of Excellence creating an inspiring space for our youngest Learners Little Owls proudly reopened its doors in 2024 and I'm delighted to share that our program is now flourishing with full enrollment and a growing waiting list second I want to take a moment to celebrate our preap programs which are located in 12 magnet schools and 10 neighborhood schools sprinkled throughout the city historically while magnet preschools have been tuition free neighborhood schools prek programs operated on a fee based system with eligibility determined by family income this disparity presented a significant Equity issue our
046most vulnerable students and families were unable to uh access free preschool opportunities under the leadership of Dr Torres Rodriguez and chief Barney and driven by a steadfast commitment to equity they secured funding to remove the financial barrier for our neighborhood preap programs and this year all students in Hartford regardless of the program they attend now have access to free preschool I warmly invite you to explore our neighborhood prek programs where you can see firsthand how our students are growing with confidence and preparing to take their next steps into kindergarten additionally I invite you to visit Little Owls at Hartford Public High School to witness the unwavering dedication of our staff as they nurture and engage with our very youngest Learners in closing I want to express my deepest gratitude for your support of Early Childhood
047initiatives that have shaped programs like little owls and neighborhood pre your commitment extends far beyond the classroom together we are ensuring brighter futures for our youngest Learners and the families we serve thank you so much hi good evening everyone um I just want to say Doo to the magic Soul um they are excellent group um and uh we use them sometimes for our community event and so indeed if you can support them financially please do help them first I must say um to the board members thank you for serving I know it's a tankless job right so thank you uh superintendent I also want to thank you for serving us for how many years um you know I I just want to let you know wish you all the best okay I'm not sure if
048I'll be at the next board but I just want to let you know that so I have a few things few suggestion I want to make um you know so first I would like for the board to look into a policy that address the cell phone issue in our schools you know we wonder why our children are are failing the school RS and stuff like that um because they're too engaged in their cell phone I just seen New Haven put a policy in place maybe we look at their policy and see what they have but we have to do something something similar to that okay I know most parents don't perhaps want that but wake up parents we have to do something all right we need our children to achieve and the distraction that they
049have to go through during the day it's enough for them not to learn anything so please try to look at put in a policy together um I was reading the blue ribbon for a little bit um report uh what I did not see in there about you know working on maybe some consolidation of some of our Magnet School our city Magnet School whatever the case may be I mean there's too many high schools I mean I think the elementary school are okay but the high school we have too many of them we could fit a school within a school like we do classica magnet have another school and so we need to look at those things nobody wants to talk about consolidation but we need to we do not have the kids anymore and we
050have to be real about life all right um so that's one of the other issue um Chef I would have thought they might have you know addressed the issue of Chef and we actually this school system has not learned anything from Chef because if they had we wouldn't have lost so many kids to the suburb okay busting them out that's costing a lot of money we would change the way we're doing we need quality with our school and super I've talked to you a couple of time about how we can do this to make it work one school at a time make sure all the humanity is in these schools our parents will stay in the city if they know that our children getting quality education it's all about quality we need to get back
051to the basic learning English math science whatever the case may be too much initiative is coming to our teachers they can't keep up with all those initiative and it's affecting our children too so we need to be real about stuff you know there are simple things that we can do not complicated to make education successful all right so let's look into some of that um and some of those things uh it's it's really important and um I also want to tell you superintendent we are having um uh my son stem day in May 20 yet if you like to come all right um the universities will be there so so again I just want to wish you all the best Michael [Music] Susi sorry I took a month off um one thing I want to
052do is I want to actually thank the students who spoke I I know that there was a few from Capital prep I'm not sure if they're here anymore but the students who were from Magic Soul which I'm not going to lie I no IDE existed but hearing from the students their testimony about uh what that was about and the impact that it has for them and had for them um I think is astounding and I know how difficult it is for students to come up here and speak because well especially in this setting you're above me um so I do really appreciate you guys doing that so so I speak here for obviously I'm from Hartford High right I wear the shirt I wear it with pride right I speak for the kids that can't
053speak because either they can't or they're not comfortable with it I have a lot of ml students right I have students Spanish Portuguese Somali Swahili erdu veran and now I got Dar which I did not know that was a language and I'm a history teacher so um you know trying to communicate with those students you know they're they're not comfortable necessarily having their voice so I stand here for them right I have students who use the little owls program okay um where they won't be able to come into school if they did not have that child care and what I'm pleading for is is I know we're talking about this um you know we're getting into the budgeting season I know that there's the equity budget but I assure you that's not really Equitable okay
054specifically at the high school level right if you specifically look at say my school right we have an extremely high number of ml students we have an extremely high level of special ed students okay I have a lot of I'm a sophomore teacher I have a lot of N9 RS so you got to look past the numbers right so we have a lot of students who don't make create all their credits off of their freshman year and they kind of need that extra support So giving me a class of 28 ml students mixed in with special ed students mixed in with everything else right I adore my kids I love my I love my students but that's asking a lot to teachers and if you're going to cut positions that makes my life and other
055teachers lives PA professionals admin whoever is affected by this that makes their job so much difficult and you're talking about teacher retention how you going to retain teachers when you add even more to their workload cutting the staff and because pretty much you can say like we want teacher attention right that's what the contract the new contracts about but actions speak louder than words so I need you to see that in you when you're in your budgeting process to see that it's not Equitable you're treating it equally and there's a difference between equity and equality equality is you treat everybody the same that's what that budget process is equity is realizing that you need some resources you need more resources in one place than you do for another Carol G good evening members of the
056board student representatives and superintendent my name is Carol Gail I'm a Harford resident and president of the Harford Federation of teachers on tonight's agenda is a second reading of the district calendar hftt was represented in the committee that drafted this calendar and appreciated the process that led to this grp creation the calendar you are voting on this evening reflects one change from the calendar draft you saw last month it includes only two half days during the first week of school instead of four half days while the four half days represented a slow roll out to the new school year and was supported by staff and students there were some concerns raised by parents that resulted in the reduced number of half days overall it is a well-designed calendar which you will hopefully approve this evening
057the second item I wish to comment on this evening is Educational Funding clearly the Harford public school's budget relies on funding from local state and federal governments tomorrow the education Committee of our general assembly will hold a public hearing I urge every board member every administrator every educator every interested person in this room to submit testimony regarding education funding last week week another education Committee hearing was held on different bills many Educators administrators and concerned citizens testified including over a dozen Hartford teachers and support staff each testimony makes a difference I will be testifying tomorrow and urging our legislators to adjust Equalization grants in the following ways adjust for inflation increase the base per pupil level of $1,525 where it has been flat funded for over a decade to adjust for inflation and include an
058index for inflation moving forward to increase the weight for economically disadvantaged students from 30% to 40% to increase the weight for multilingual Learners from 25% to 35% and to add a 50% weight for students with disabilities furthermore our state must adequately fund Public Schools the increase in Charter and magnet schools in our state has not solved the problems and challenges to educating our youth we want strong neighborhoods we want neighborhood schools that provide a bond of community that unite us and don't further separate us the solution is to adequately fund our Public Schools governed by elected bodies like yourselves so parents have true Choice the choice of guaranteed enrollment not waiting lists not lotteries not rejections the choice to engage in a local Board of Ed about issues through transparent processes such as these public
059comment sessions the kids who need the most are getting the least Connecticut ranks 46th in funding students for low incomes 49th in funding students of color and 48th in funding multilingual Learners yet our state has $6 billion in reserves Connecticut must fully fund our local public schools to guarantee every child in Connecticut receives a high quality education no matter where they live or how much money their parents make please testify on behalf of Hartford students for fully funding our schools it is definitely what kids need thank you Michael DS [Music] good evening board members superintendent student board members I'm Michael DS 74 Rosemont Street in Hartford and I'm um I'm also president of the Harvard Federation of substitute teachers and um I last month uh addressed you concerning a problem of the W2 forms being
060um sent to substitute teachers um this problem is being resolved it has not been completely resolved but we are resolving it with the city treasurer City payroll department and our own payroll the Harford Public School payroll department um and I hope it will by uh the next next meeting uh it should be resolved because of course tax day income tax day is the 15th of April another issue I wanted to discuss living in the The Barber Tower North Main area is the wish School construction I noticed the deconstruction has happen completely the uh the building is completely flat down to the to the ground I see some machines out there uh I know that my neighbors are um uh anxious about uh the construction so I hope the construction begins soon we hope the construction
061begins soon the third thing I want to address is um homelessness among students uh this is something that uh has been been known by many of us that deal with um the neighborhood schools many of the students are homeless or uh come from dire property uh and um they require things food um many come in they're in the breakfast program and they're uh of course on the lunch program and U those are on an after school activities um are also served a u an evening meal and uh so I think it's important that we really um try and increase the I know last the last meeting we did increase have some increase increases in our after school activities uh programs and I think it's important that we continue that and increase them even more because
062uh this is one way in which more students there are more students out there that need these activities and can't get them and it also allows them to have another meal and although I say you know many people say well it's not up to the school system to feed these students well if they're homeless and they come from um uh areas that are uh exist in dire poverty um I think we do have a an obligation a moral obligation to feed these students and also something is last I'd like to address is their their health it is um important that uh we U try and increase the amount of health programs that we have uh in our school systems um there are some in in some schools but most schools all they have is a
063school nurse and many times that's not enough um thank you our last is John Walton [Music] good evening superintendent distinguished board members uh students of magic soul and staff of magic Soul I'm so impressed and proud of the work you guys have accomplished um we're willing to partner with you local 566 and op operation so that some of those students can address some of the funding issues by working with our departments to uh have summer work so that they can make money uh to address some of those needs now on a larger issue I hope that this board has heard them and would like to um add some funding to what they need in order to keep that program moving forward and like you students of magic soul I was a uh student that uh
064from this community Albany Avenue uh who made a lot of bad decisions despite having good parents and I went down many of those bad roads that you heard some of the students mentioned thank God there was Grace that uh he was looking over me and I decided to uh go in another Direction so I'm hoping that we can fund programs like this so that the students have an opportunity to have the same path that I was able to take even though I made very bad decisions to the student board members I'm so proud of you because I've been watching you and you guys are so engaged and that is amazing to see because this is important you need to be in command and in control and informed of the direction that your uh educational system
065is going in who I am is not important but what I represent is most important and what I represent is an informed taxpayer an informed parent an informed Community member I live in Harford my child goes to Harford public schools and you know many of these systems wanted to keep us disenfranchised because they didn't want informed individuals like myself and like yourselves are part of the educational process because it's easy to control people when they're not informed about what their rights are so you heard me last board meetings be very critical of the people that I work with in supervision and administration and of course I'm critical of them you know why because they hold public office they're servants like myself we serve you we serve the parents who pay the taxes here we serve
066the students who go to these schools and that is a important duty so if we have to be critical of where we spend our tax dollars then the people who are allowed to work in our community should understand our criticism unless they produce good results you need to be critical of the people who work in your systems because they owe a duty to you to make sure they get it right or at least try so if we happen to hurt a few feelings because we make comments that does not tickle their fancy so be it that's democracy and we have to hand you over democracy we have to hand you over and Usher you into a new system where you have the ability to have Equitable treatment Equitable education and Equitable opportunities so for those
067who are at the last board meeting my members were saying there there were comments behind me because I can't see behind me about people being unclear or uncertain of what I'm saying or very you know shocked by what I was saying well if you're doing the right thing in Harford Public Schools then you shouldn't be shocked and it shouldn't affect you at all but if you're not it probably is something that is a pain point so what I'm going to do is reintroduce what I said last board meeting I'm willing my board my union is willing to make a $3,000 pledge to the after school programming so that the services for the students can they can have those Services especially in the health department where we uh need to do the work in order for
068you guys to have the proper support $3,000 of Union money $2,000 for my personal money for the same process I would also like to make a pledge to Magic soul but I'll do that in private um anybody especially administrators who make upwards of 150 to 180 and so on are should be willing to make the same pledge that's when you prove that you really care about the community you work in because now you're ready to give a give back to the same system that has allowed you to drive a luxury car and buy a nice house and and and and be able to wear fancy clothes so those administrators and everyone else who is willing to put their money where their heart is I would like you to join that pledge now what we should
069be doing is bringing back all parents into our schools parents really listen to me Community really listen to me Co took you out of the schools and we still have the same rules as when Co was around we need to bring back parents back into our schools we have a security system that can vet everyone if you pass that security system then we need parents back into the schools so that they can help with Hall monitoring classroom monitoring and help the direct staff and the teachers and actually see what happens in their Public Schools so they can be a part of the new process by keeping individuals out of our schools we are just keeping the truth away from them let's bring them back now let's I had said and and and the superintendent if
070you remember we had a meeting and it wasn't just us it was all the union leaders which I said if I were in your position I would make sure there was a strong SGC in each school with an SGC president of each school to oversight all of the administrations in our schools to make sure that they know what the budgets are doing and what is happening in their schools and then the superintendent could could have a select committee of those SGC presidents which then she chooses or he chooses to then have oversight over the superintendent and their cabinet and what's happening that then the Board of Education could didn't meet with and find out what the concerns are directly because a lot of times the information you get is skewed it's you you don't get
071to talk and get real information so we need to bring that back there was a reason why they didn't want strong sgc's and why they wanted to keep strong sgc's out of school is to keep us blind I had some other talking points but I know I ran over my time I don't want to keep taking off your time but I just want to say this real quickly last board meeting it was the student board member who asked the question about the harassment committee and it was the rest of the board members who said is that committee fair and it should be fair and unparal well you had leadership come up here and tell you well we have administrators on the committee but let me give you an example if for example the and I'll
072just use this please don't get mad at me Deputy because uh I'm just using this because you answered the question uh if we had the deputy accused of anything and all of the people who were sitting in the committee that has to make the judgment on that case answers to the deputy what do you think they're going to do are they going to give fair and impartial decisions no probably not well we would hope they would but if they have to answer to the deputy or they have to answer to a higher authority sorry Deputy if you think I'm picking on you I'm not but I'm just using it as an example then you can't get an impartial decision from that so what we should be doing is saying all right if we're going to
073have a committee of Administrators who render decisions on regular non-certified or certified employment then we should have the non-certified employment and and brender decisions on the administrators now the game is fair that would encourage both sides to have good intentions and not control the outcomes I'm so glad that you guys are paying attention and remember all of us everyone the Board of Education me the board members are elected officials who are here to do their duties and I salute you but we are all accountable to you everyone sitting behind me works for you and to protect to provide and to educate and that is their Duty no matter how much money they make thank you for your time and thank you for your attention and that concludes public comments first thank you to everyone who
074came out to speak tonight especially the students I know it was incredibly difficult but you did an fabulous job thank you for sharing your stories and being so authentic tonight really do appreciate your time we're going to have a little bit of change to the schedule um or to our agenda and we're going to mix things up a little bit I'm going to let the superintendent do her um update first um so that we can have a little bit of a surprise because it's a board meeting so why not have some surprises tonight make it a little fun so superintendent I'll turn it over to you thank you thank you yes good evening everyone I actually first would like to take a moment to acknowledge Connecticut Board of Education member appreciation month a special time
075in March to recognize our state board members and to celebrate their significant contribution in governing of course our district and advocating for our students for our Educators and for the Harford Public Schools Community I am deeply grateful to each and every one of you for your generously right you generously volunteer your time your expertise your commitment for the succession uh the successful operation of Harford Public Schools um and most recently there's been a lot of advocacy that you've been engaging in and so I want to acknowledge you for that as well you are all critical in making Mak sure that we are complying with State guidelines establishing smart policy and making strategic decisions to meet the needs and interests of all of our students our families and our community it is often not an easy
076task it is um again a volunteer task that you take on um and so I want to extend a special thank you to each and every one of you um Miss Santiago has a small token of appreciation um I ask all of you to just help me Express gratitude um to our board members please and I understand that magic Soul Academy is here uh with their instrument and so while we're in the spirit of gratitude um if magic Soul you have like two minutes three minutes to show your magic um while we're expressing gratitude to our board members this is your this is your shot they're not ready okay I I have my next oh they're ready this is what we call a brain break stretch out break [Music] so for [Music] f [Music] magic
077so let's go [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] how's that for gratitude and now and now I have to give an update on the budget I'm so sorry sorry Miss Santiago um do you have a just want to provide everyone with an update on where we are relative to the uh fiscal year 26 budget process and on the Public Works inquiry from uh the state and their recommendations I want to thank you all uh those of you that have been participating in our uh budget Community uh forums our fiscal year 2026 budget presents uh both challenges and opportunities while revenue is projected to increase by 2.1% remember Revenue that is the money that's coming in it does it is it is going to increase by 2.1 largely due to the final phase of the additional State education
078cost share funding the expenses are expected to grow by 4.9% right so money coming in is going to increase by 2.1 but the money that has to go out is going to increase all by 4.9 so there is a gap there the the reasons for that include uh salary increases from our contractual obligations the rising costs in special education and transportation costs and inflation and as a result we currently are facing a $30 million deficit even with flat Services budget um a flat service budget which means that we're we're seeking to maintain the current programming and Staffing levels even keeping it as is we're still facing those $30 million uh deficit now the Gap really underscores the importance of uh strategic Investments being so so smart with the Investments and continued collaboration and advocacy right
079with with the city and the state leaders to sustain the essential services for our students in our next slide we have been working on two strategies truly to assess uh to address our deficit one is proposed reductions to our budget for next year and legislative advocacy to increase our Revenue we have had two Community forums so far in which community members provided feedback on the the ideas and suggestions for mitigating for closing the Gap and we've brought this feedback back to to you all as our Board of Education to update our our set of reduction options which we will share with you tonight we also have been working on legislative advocacy we have a list of tasks that uh of asks really that we're thinking of uh that the city our our our partners at
080the city can support us with um so that they can fund if you will some of these um as well we've also shared some of these ideas with the legislature in case there is an additional funding stream that we can um be able to leverage for Harford Public Schools so how much money we are able to get from the legislative advocacy um will have a direct impact on the amount of that deficit that we need to reduce from our budget so we're going to continue to keep you all updated on the estimates as we go as we you know kind of go through through the budget process we are still aiming to bring to you all uh for a a vote the uh the budget for Mid April and based on some of the community
081feedback and reviewing our budget with you all as a board we have a set of reduction um options for next year uh those that are on the slide and we're going to share this in is going to be uh embedded in the report some of this we actually shared last night during our virtual community budget Forum note that these reduction options only total 15 million so the good news is that we're halfway there um in mitigating the 30 million and that we still have halfway to go we'll need to make additional reductions if we do not receive additional funding from the city and the state funding um we're going to cover uh the first two school-based reduction options in more detail in the next slide but they involve some changes to the formula for allocating
082teachers and non-certified staff to school sites while increasing the amount of tital one funding that is going to go to schools we also have the option of reducing security guard allocations let me explain not any of the allocations directly at school sites however uh uh reducing some of the positions that we have as floaters uh that help throughout the district U the magnet school supplement has been phased out over the past several years this year um is supposed to be the last year of that implementation it was part of the old school funding allocation model and we wanted to kind of phase it out over time instead of just completely removing it from the schools at one you know at at at one point um and so we're also thinking about reductions not thinking we
083are going to see reductions at central office both both in terms of staff and non-salary expenses and we're looking for the roles that um will have the least negative impact on our school services and and school sites finally we are planning to set some targets to review our special education door-to-door Transportation right this means that um we have students that have transportation that takes them from right front door to the front from front door of their house to the front door of their school and so we're we're asking our teams to to take a look at whether or not there are additional savings there um so we'll absolutely continue to uh keep the services that students need relative to special education and transportation but we're looking to see if there are any ways that some
084of those Services can be um either Consolidated or shared um our transportation budget just as a reminder is 30 million and 23 million of that is door-to-door transportation those are big big numbers so the way that we allocate teachers and other staff to school sites is through Staffing formulas these formulas are based on student enrollment schools may see changes if their enrollment changes or if the formula changes for next year we see overall lower enrollment and we have made some changes to that formula resulting in a total of about 30 teaching positions across the schools now we do have a number number of vacancies that we have at the moment and so we do not believe that any of these reductions will actually impact people an example is shown on this on this slide uh
085for example last year the high school formula was 21 students for one teacher rounding up so for a school of 530 students this would result in 26 teachers and 20 students per class on average next year we're proposing 21 students one one extra student per teacher rounded so for the same school this would mean 25 total teachers and 21 students per class on average so in other words it translates to a loss of about one teacher um and just to note that some schools may experience greater losses if you remember last year there was um a one-time uh infusion of funding that allowed us to restore some of the positions after the the budget had been passed and so there is no plan currently in the budget for those added positions and so some schools
086might see added numbers because of that um so those roles are not part of the Staffing formulas and so schools again may may experience a greater loss because of this so we are uh not allocating student engagement Specialists Behavior text family and Community Support providers directly to school sites instead we are providing them with their full Title One application from which they can decide if they want to invest in some of those positions based on their school level needs so Title One funding a reminder is federal funding allocated to schools for both instructional and non-instructional supports the amount the total amount of Title One funding is about 5 million more than what schools would have received through the equity based starter budget discretionary funds so that's an additional amount note that um again the board
087has a set guard rail for our for all schools that they have to at least have 05 of a family uh fcsp because of the importance of this role uh turning to our advocacy work which is important so that right we're not having to make further Cuts we are working with the city to uh see if there are additional funds um and uh this list actually includes um additional opportunities for the city to fund and support Hara Public Schools examples include things like our community schools programming perhaps supporting uh some of the funding needed for our health clinics perhaps supporting with artart with Athletics extracurriculars um High School programming um perhaps supporting with scholarships for par Educators um operational items like maintenance repair upkeeping um so those are three different lists in alignment with our
088priorities um in case right there are additional funding at the city Side um lastly um want to remind everyone on the state advocacy work we encourage each and every one of you to advocate for Senate and House Bill 1511 because it has changes that we need for our financial sustainability remember sustainability we talk about not just solving for next year but for years to come that we can sustain that support that funding those resources it includes um this bill it includes changes to the base amount per student in the state funding formula and also increasing the amount for economically disadvantaged students students in schools that have a higher concentration of poverty like many but like actually all of our Magnet School uh neighborhood schools multilingual learning our students and it also adds an added weight
089for special education which is desperately needed given our special education costs so there's a barcode here to get a letter that you can send directly to your legislators um and again we're going to continue to share other ways for you to uh for you to help Advocate lastly last slide again thanking everyone that has been uh involved in the budget process so far we have another barcode uh QR code this is just in casee you want to give additional feedback and input on our budget um join either you know make sure that you join your SGC you can provide feedback through uh the survey you can join us on the April 1 budget hearing again we need your voice we need your advocacy lastly sorry I have one more slide um the Public Works report
090uh Public Works is the technical assistance provider that the State Board of Education um hired to have an inquiry into our um Financial uh processes and procedures and so after six months of review um they found that there could be $400,000 in savings um they did have some recommendations around improving our processes and procedures these recommendations including organizing finance and Leadership strengthening our GL Grant planning and execution uh fiscal uh management practices upgrading some policies and developing standard operating procedures many of these I'm not going to go into the details many of these changes are already complete or underway such as the reorganizing in the finance leadership we are actively working with Public Works who's providing technical assistance around creating a comprehensive manuals u a comprehensive procedure manual um we again I'll reiterate what I
091said at the beginning we welcome the the the inquiry um you know there were initial um uh statements and insinuations by different people that there were millions and millions of dollars at Harford Public Schools was not leveraging clearly that is incorrect that is not true um and so we are grateful that um they're pointing to $400,000 in savings that is not $30 million um to address our current Gap nonetheless we're all for improving processes and procedures and we will continue to do that um that includes my report all right thank you superintendent um we will now move on to the chair's report um first uh we participated at the day on the hill uh Mr Walker Miss Strada Perez and Miss Santiago participated in the cave day on the hill on March 12th they joined
092school board members from across the state to hear about priorities of cab and cab stands for con Connecticut Association of boards of education and they had the chance to hear from and speak with representative Mariam Khan and other delegates it was a great opportunity to learn a network for all who attended uh Mr Walker and Mr Tatum attended schools in February as judges for The Black History Month door decorating project it was a joy to see the students and teachers creativity and pride on display during these visits these also uh School visits also took place during this time time at Buckley as well as Global Communications [Music] academy uh the legislative and advocacy task force continues to meet to learn about upcoming bills and testimony opportunities many of which you heard about here today from
093various folks um on February 20th several um task force members board members and members of the administration submitted testimony at the elementary and secondary education public hearing and as Miss Gale um already said that there is a hearing tomorrow on Wednesday March 18th um if you are interested in getting more involved um there was a QR code up there but also you are welcome to reach out to miss Christina Santiago at C Santiago hartfordschools.org on February 24th the board tabled at the community budget Forum that was held at MLK School uh it was great to see so many families uh that attended the budget or aren't interested in the budget process and as a budget person I'm extra excited to see all the folks that are really excited about the budget process and want to
094learn more um because there's a lot that goes into it right we don't just sit around and do nothing and then pass out a budget we need all the community input all the board input you know people from all over to give us information about what they need to see so very grateful for the feedback that we received from those who are joining our meetings and the board also met on March 4th for a board retreat to further discuss these budget challenges so we have been doing a great deal of talking about about all things budget and we just really appreciate the rich discussion between the administration and the board as we work through this challenging budget cycle an update on the superintendent search process so the board has officially retained a search firm to
095assist with the transition this is an incredibly important process so we look forward to working with the expertise and guidance that the search firm will bring to our process the search committee will consist of all Hartford board of education members these meetings are confidential however we will engage community and provide regular updates to the community throughout the process the board had an introductory meeting with the firm on Wednesday March 12th our next step is individual meetings with the search firm followed by Community engagement this will be very similar to the community engagement that we' have done with budget process and also what we did with the Strategic plan and the Blue Ribbon commission so please keep a lookout if you want to be involved um the application once open will be available for one month
096once the application is launched it will be noticed on the Hartford Public Schools websites on social media on various job sites and other avenues as deemed appropriate by the search firm and the search committee the goal is to have our next superintendent Nam by July 1st as a reminder the board respectfully requests that interested applicants not reach out directly to any members of the board the board will be using the search firm in order to keep the recruiting process unbiased and professional we look forward to moving this process forward as quickly as possible and engaging the community in the coming weeks this month all the Committees met the teaching and learning committee discussed the two contracts that are up for vote tonight stay plugged in and Hartford performs the policy committee discussed the harassment policy
097code of ethics School renaming sorry uh bullying and prevention the district safe School climate plan and the policy for homeless students the family and Community engagement committee discussed the partner midyear update and the school governance Council Title One and welcome center reports and the finance committee discussed the 2026 budget and the Public Works audit so as a reminder you can find the superintendent report full committee reports student reports and all attachments and videos on or sorry in the meetings agend genda on board docs all committee and workshop meetings are live streamed as well as viewable after the meeting the YouTube links are saved in each of the meetings agendas on board docs I highly encourage the community to view the meetings and read the reports when possible if you have any questions or feedback please
098contact Miss Christina Santiago our board liaison at C Santiago Harford schools.org before I turn over to the students I have a public statement to read on February 18th a former employee of the Hartford Public Schools made a statement to the board during public comment that suggested the superintendent uh Torres Rodriguez engaged in some unspecified appropriate inappropriate action the Hartford board of education values the Integrity of its employees including the including of course its superintendent moreover Dr Torres Rodriguez immediately asked that these vague allegations be investigated so that her name could be cleared on behalf of the board I reached out to assistant Corporation coun Council laori Mizer and asked her to conduct an independent investigation of the allegations made by this former employee given that the former employee provided no facts to substantiate her suggestion
099that Dr Torres Rodriguez had engaged in some sort of wrongdoing on behalf of the board I also reached out directly to the former employee to ask whether she could provide any specific information inform to support her allegations in response the former employee did not provide any specific information to support the claim that Dr Torres Rodriguez engaged in any wrongdoing of any type moreover through her independent review attorney M reached the following conclusions in summary in summary I find that there is no evidence to support the claims that Miss Serrano made during the February 18th 2025 Boe meeting that the superintendent asked her for a favor and asked her to keep a secret about this favor or anything else I further find that there is no evidence to support Miss Serrano's claim that any alleged conversation
100or meeting that she had with the superintendent in any way factored into or formed the basis of the district's decision to terminate her finally I find there is no evidence to support Miss Serrano's claim that the District refused to allow her to resign in Le of termination in the light of this it is my recommendation that the Boe close out this matter given the forging I do not see a need to further a any further action by the board and appreciate this opportunity to set the record straight we will now move on to the report of the students we have uh Miss TSH Brown and uh Miss Wright here to talk I'll will turn it over to you ladies thank you thank you due to weather our meeting from last Tuesday was our first meeting
101as a group since our January 14th meeting all students were just as eager to receive information as our last two meetings we received valuable information the goal of this meeting was to build off of the budget information that received from the January 14th meeting to start this meeting we had a scavenger hunt for items this allowed for students to be competitive while bonding at the the same time the core of this meeting was to mock the budget exercise that Caitlyn Richard CFO Felicity facilitated first we discussed budget guiding principles and how budgets are allocated and then we received our 2025 26 budget templates in these templates we were given all the variables that are used in our real budget formula in groups of eight we had to act as neighborhood or Magnet School principles of
102middle and high schools and decide how we wanted to use our budget afterward we had a group discussion about how hard some of these decisions were and why we made them for the second portion of our meeting Deputy superintendent Dr Contra ratley facilitated a group decision on grading and Sell Phone policies and then we closed out with a fun game of Charades some of the key points that we talked about as a group include if we were principls of high schools we would put our money towards College and Career supports and there are hardly any there is hardly any space in our already sparse budget for AP and ECE courses it is also very hard to pick between teachers and important support important support staff when given a certain amount of money more than 50%
103make making 50% the lowest grade possible allows students to come back after doing virtually nothing and it is unfair to students who work hard all year round and still struggle with work due to the No Child Left Behind students who are behind are still being pushed forward even if staying back would be the best course of action for them some of our students also believed that our district wasted a lot of money on the Yonder pouches because the policy isn't even being enforced in all the schools in the district and we understand that phones are distracting but they can be an important academic tool if used wisely there are cheaper alternatives for making phones for keeping phones away during important learning times and we also feel that students should learn to self-regulate now as phones
104won't be taken away in college or in the workplace um some positives from meeting was that we are continuing to feel more connected as Harford students and by working together it is playing a major role in just connecting to other students or group activity it was fun and engaging and it was also informative this meeting allowed the ssac to share what is going on in or schools and what we learned about the budgeting process and that was our report thank you thank you student Representatives that was a great report all right we will now move on to the business agenda uh item 4.1 contract approval stay plugged in Esports motion that the Hartford board of education authorize the superintendent to execute a contract with stay plugged in in the amount of$ 283,000 $283,600 for the
105term outlined in the contract ending June 30th 2025 do I have a motion so move second second thank you I will turn it over to Dr Tores Rodriguez thank you um just a background on the agenda item um relative to the um stay plugged in the funds are magnet athletic grant for a total of 283,000 283,000 00 over three for three schools gr path Pathways and canella we know that sports are really an extension of a good um educational program and that we here in Harford public schools are focused on supporting the whole student when students participate in uh activity programs they tend to have higher grade point averages better attendance lower Dropout rates fewer disciplinary challenges uh these programs provide valuable lessons and skills for practical application teamwork fair play hard work self-confidence you
106name it many many benefits and so the goals of um surrounding this athletic Grant proposal include growing interest at the middle school level to develop and sustain freshman JV and varsity levels creating strong and competitive Varsity programs by developing athletes at a much younger age building a climate and culture of teamwork collegiality and maintaining a robust sportsmanlike um Athletic program and developing ways to further connect our families and communities to athletic programs so uh great path looks to Target students in grades 9 through 12 by building out in ESP Sports lab with gaming stations cabling display boards for the furniture room setup Pathways uh the same thing and then canella will be targeting grades 9 through 12 uh through 8 Connecticut inser Scholastic Athletic Conference initiative canella is partnered uh with Weaver High School to
107offer opportunities for all canella students to participate in athletics at Weaver and so the funds will be used to support with additional equipment to expand Weaver's Esports room and so they can compete collaboratively I'll pause there I know that we have a variety of our uh leaders here uh representing our schools Dr Fitzgerald principal Maisy ARS principal O'Brien our our director of Athletics Heidi schmith is here I mean we name it they're all here so I'll pause there uh board members in case you have questions and comments any questions or discussion no no yeah go go ahead I won't ask my question that I ask every single time I won't put them through the agony but I trust at this point in time that while we'll accomplish it definitely at canella cuz their sports are
108with Weaver that when we are um looking at these opportunities and when they are in our magnet schools that we're making sure that our Harford students are participating in them that's my comment excuse me the Harford resident because all Harford public schools are all our children but the Harford resident students that they're participating and being a part of um such a great opportunity Mr Walker um thank you um my question is really about the expenditure of the funds um they seem to be directed towards building out projects so is the intent that the project must must be complete or just that the funds have to be allocated by the uh end of the school year Chief Barney if you can speak to the magnet Grant and and also the conversations have had happened with the
109state uh as the Resco so uh to your questionman board M Walker um the grant is the is to set up the Esports rooms and expand the programming to provide the consoles to uh get all the licensing and that would need to be done by um the end of June so that way that the teams could start in the uh fall so all of the funds would be expended by the end of the school year for for uh all of the grants yeah uh thank you for that uh feedback I know last year we got some questioning about whether we would be spending money before the term so thank you for confirm in that and that's all cleared with Resco as well that um fund all this went through um with Resco uh went back
110and forth between athletic department um and with our operations Department to ensure that it me met the guidelines of the athletic Grant and for approval I'm curious to know uh how do the schools go about trying to recruit the students into these Esports programs is it more word of mouth um what's the process to get as many students participating as possible so I definitely know word of mouth is one of them but I would love to invite up some of the schools or our athletic director to talk about how they go about uh recruitment because uh each school is different uh and each School reaches out to their students in a different way uh but we definitely know a word of mouth has been just even across the district uh is what pushes kid kids
111to get enrolled in it I can speak for the Athletics side hi good evening I'm Heidi Schmidt the director of Athletics I can assure you that we are broadcasting Esports the same way do all of our Athletics and they do follow all of our Athletics at the high school level and at the middle school level that we're running the eorts after school they're following all the same guidelines as our after school athletes we make them follow our GPA they have to follow our attendance rules and they also have to follow having a physical making sure that they're in good shape so they're broadcasted and sent out the same way we do all of our Athletics and we've had a really good um diversity between the Harford residents and our Suburban um residents actually our Harford
112residents are higher um with participation in these in these classrooms when we're doing these after school so hopefully that hope so we'll have to talk about the in school stuff go ahead hello good evening Mike masier is the principal at uh Pathways Academy of technology and design uh thank you for having us I would say for us that this is a huge recruitment um uh piece of our school and more so than that does a really great job of expanding our program offering as a technology and design being our theme in a Naf school um in addition to English math science and social studies we're able to offer our students a variety of other courses in classes and programs that align to our theme because that is what we hope and see that the reason
113students want to come to our school is experienced that and we are very fortunate this year to be able to offer for the first time um Sports uh with a partnership with um smsa and to be able to offer Esports allows um another Avenue for us to to expand our programming um there's a huge interest from students uh but also that piece of climate and culture um to have that that team that that collaboration where students can come together who have a common interest um in Esports is something that has a high level of Interest with students now thank you Mike Neil Sullivan assistant principal great PATH Academy I'm here um representing great path and Dr Fitz sherald this program is has already been launched at Great path we have a class called gaming Concepts
114which has the highest course request of all of our courses um we piloted it last year and with 100% pass rate with over 50% of our students Hartford residents were thrilled to extend it we have an after school program currently for an Esports Club that's run by a teacher um we have a pathway connected with State CT Manchester about teched and Esports and gaming Concepts so this will also support that the kids are thrilled to compete with one another our staff joins it and esport just has boomed across 612 and at the Collegiate level so we're we're really excited to get the room up and running that this grant is really going to provide the facilities and the infrastructure that's that we're really seeking I'm not sure who this question goes out too but I'm
115just wondering if there is a similar grant for public schools cuz I know that this is geared towards the magnet schools and if there isn't why and how is it possible for the public schools to be included in this uh perhaps athletic director Smith can speak to that and I just want to clarify right all of our uh you're asking our neighborhood schools right yes okay that's a great question um so first of all obviously the the grant that we did receive was through the magnet school so that's where our our first first um Avenues have gone but we do do a lot of co-oping in our athletic sports so we are looking at looking at schools that do not maybe have rooms available in there but a close neighborhood school that does have it
116so that we can offer and open up our doors to allow them to join some of the programming and join the teams that we do have established we're just it's really getting off the ground right now at the athletic side of it and we're starting to create um we're coming up this spring with a league within the within the district so once we get all of our Labs up and running we are going to start looking and reaching out to what student athletes are interested or just students are interested in getting involved in Esports and finding ways to connect them with with schools that have the rooms and then hopefully one day down the road we can start looking at some other grants and other um ways of getting funding for these rooms because they
117they are kind of pricey does that answer your question yes thank [Music] you she asked my question but I have a follow-up question I know we're talking about setting up the room and the importance of setting up the room and sort of getting everything situated do we have an idea of how many students we want to see get involved in the program do we have an idea how many students this would serve and I know it'll that it'll vary by by by by school and by you know area but it would be good to see do you have a goal do you have a sports do you mean well we have we're using it in two different areas too we're using them in the classroom and in sports we haven't capped a number um for
118for the athletic for the After School portion of it there are new games coming out all the time there are new different interest NFL is getting involved now so there's going to be a lot more involved with the NFL and I know here comes our state champion for Esports over here uh Mr toy from University um but yeah I we are I mean we haven't kept it so and like I said it's really new and and it's getting out there and we're trying to reach out to all the different um people that are interested in it the students so yeah we're looking to improve it but I'll let you come on I don't sit so well so I'm just going to stand and talk so three years ago I sat in front of some of
119you board members here putting for one of the first orts rooms and what I can tell you updating you now is that it's an integral part of my school right in the mornings kids are coming up and my Esports coach is opening that room and kids are going in there I'd like to tell you they're doing school workor but they're coming to school they're making friends they're bonding with people they're enjoying when they come to school secondly third year we're starting to get kids that are getting scholarships right legit scholarships to play video games I know it's a little crazy right but what's happen happen now too is right I have a show a showcase that we do every fall right where I have up to 11 or 12 colleges coming to watch kids play
120video games to offer scholarships right they're also watching on Discord which if you don't know what that is they're online they're watching it but they're watching kids play video games right my next step is what I'm trying to do or what I want to do I don't know if Heidi knows this but I want to start a tournament in Harford right we all hopefully know who doc Hurley is who led one of the most Premier High School basketball tournaments in the country I want to do something like that for Harvard right I'm on the Esports committee for the state nobody else is doing this Harford is being first right we're being first at something that's positive and good so I want to thank all of you up there for your support I really want to
121thank Heidi who has done a ton of work behind the scenes and helped me and put up with me thank you [Music] yeah thank you chair um I think this is for hiding kin and it's um it's about the neighborhood school funding so um is there a way to to to kind of insist that moving forward there's at least a one in one so for every magnet school that needs to be a a community school because right now I think we're 4 and0 in terms of magnet schools is it is it just that there's no flexibility with how that money gets deployed so so board member Walker specifically with the magnet school Grant it is solely for magnet schools which is why we are working collaboratively um with canella and Weaver because we have heard
122that we want to see more of our neighborhood schools with that connection however Weaver has an Esports lab currently so they are a neighborhood school who who utilize prior grant funding to have a lab Canela then is using their funding to build out their own team that will then support building out the Weaver lab so that then they can compete together Hartford High also has an Esports lab as well that they've utilized prior grant funding to put in so there have been other grant opportunities as um Heidi said for neighborhood schools to utilize this um but regularly Resco releases the extracurricular uh or sorry athletic there's a lot of magnet grants um every year they've released the athletic Grant whereas neighborhood school funding not necessarily would have something recurring every year so we are looking
123at to your point how how to balance it and ensure that there is um a good balance between neighborhood and magnet schools and we're very cognizant of uh what board member Brody brought up was is how many of our actual Hartford residents are accessing our Esports programming within the magnet schools and we we reviewed the data and the majority of the students are Hartford students so the Hartford students within magnet schools that are accessing the Esports labs are greater than the students that are actually magnet students so um we will continue to look at other grant opportunities to build out Esports Labs within our neighborhood schools as well quick followup um where's the source of this of that Magnet School the magnet athletic brand what's the source it's the rest goat it's magnet funds from
124the state of Connecticut okay so I guess what I'm asking too is kind of can we shame them can we talk to them can we shame them because what because the effect the effect is we talk inequity but they're they're kind of they're create they're created some inequity here um maybe unintentionally and it's not about turning away the money but maybe voicing back to them how this is impacting the district because I think the the principal from University High School is talking about doc Hurley and modeling that kind of you know tournament and in a way it's going to be a doct type tournament but the Community Schools won't be at the Forefront of it right and so find opportunity to say hey maybe that open their eyes to redirecting the money to help us
125help them right be more Equitable he's looking at me yes um we will continue to to say that there are unintended consequences board member Walker um but I Al and I also think that we can continue to explore alternative funding sources to have even if it's like one that we start um in a neighborhood school to become Hub um so duly noted thank you so much um my question is um with regards to the cyber bullying with regards to um different situations that take place online is there a component where you educate your students prior to going online and playing these games and what sort of also managing their anger because I always think about the social emotional learning piece that goes along um because I have I have a a child at home I
126will not say who it is but I have a he knows who he is I have a child at home who plays video games and I've seen um you know when they lose how do they do they lose gracefully do they you know how does how do you work that into your um into to your program can someone speak to that I mean for the athletic side of it we we still we'd have them follow the same expectations we would if they were playing an actual sport out on the court the same decorum when they're cheering for each other the same decorum when they're playing each other we do have adults that are hired we actually have them get coaching certification so they have to go through the coaching courses to learn the appropriate ways
127to create a team and to cultivate one so we're we're using the same type of model that we do in our Athletics after school and we do teach them and hopefully model exactly what we expect for them we don't always get it 100% but that is our goal and that's you know the hope is that we treat it the same way and have the same expectations that we do for all of our student athletes that go out there to perform and compete apprciate you uh I just needed a quick clarification in respect to Weaver and canella canella students will be participating with Weaver's team or creating their own team because I think the last in committee when we discussed this the principal said they would those consel kids would be joining Weaver's team as they
128would any other sports team yes so they are they're going to be working collaboratively they'll be a collaborative like a co-op team yeah yeah exactly perfect thank you one thing that I just want to offer um uh so last week I was with my son uh visiting colleges out of state and all five of the institutions that we visited reference Esports and their Labs look exactly like the labs that we have so no different um so the setting is the same and so it is so important um I just wanted to further it you know double down on the access piece for all of our students um especially the ones that like don't have it in the backyard of the magnet school so I just have one more thing to say I remember when this
129first came up um years ago some years you know when this initially was brought up for vote and I remember asking the question um are there scholarships are there opportunities for young people to pretty much take this into college or or you know make a career of it or something and it's beautiful to see how this has blossomed into something that is really taking on I don't want to say a life of its own but it's really a beautiful thing to see that students are benefiting from it they are going to college they are earning scholarships and they're excited they're um they're just looking forward to learning more and they're enjoying what they're doing while they're learning I just wanted to say that thank you okay seeing no one else uh the motion on the
130floor is the Hartford board of education authorized the superintendent to execute a contract with stay plugged in in the amount of $283,600 for the term outlined in the contract ending June 30th 2025 all those in favor signify by saying I I nay abstentions all right the eyes have it the the motion moves all right 4.2 contract approval Hartford performs oh thank you to everyone who talked on the last bill we appreciate you all uh motion that the Hartford board of education authorize the superintendent to execute a contract with Hartford performs in the amount of $ 58,60 for the term outlined in the contract ending June 30th 2025 do I have a motion so moved second all right uh Dr Tores Rodriguez yes uh chairperson hogen Hall you reference partnership with school systems and artists in
131commun in the community Harford performs infuses and integrates arts and cultural experiences into teaching and learning in ways that enrich the student experience and improve outcomes across the curriculum specifically the proposals uh focus on increasing access to the Arts connected to school theme student interest and our tier one curriculum creating a strong and collaborative relationship between the home what's happening um in school through enriching programming like activities beyond the classroom focusing on improving culture and climate um of art music and adaptation and student engagement in and outside of the classroom and just developing further ways to engage students um in the learning process all schools um MCD Mont montesorri uh magnet MLK breakthrough North all of them are a uh looking to add uh to their programming they currently have programming this would be additional
132uh programming that they are asking for your uh support and the funds are a combination of the magnet athletic Grant and the state Commissioners uh Network and school Improvement Grant grants any questions comments discussion I think I see someone from um Harford performs in the audience if you could share with us um I remember reading it was quite impressed with just the sheer number of hours you spend within our schools and the number of students you service and also the efforts that you put towards trying to secure additional funds so you could bring more to our students um I think those of us here and certainly everyone who's um perhaps watching on YouTube would be interested to hear that thank you so much for for um giving me the opportunity to talk about this I'm
133rorer Campbell from Harford performs um yes so we serve 10,000 students in the prek to8 schools in 31 schools across the district um every year we provide about 3400 hours of programming um all schools in across those 31 schools um all students in those schools receive programming each year and um uh we have specific programs for Middle schools as well as specific programs for the the other uh the prek-8 schools um we bring in teaching artists who are puppeteers drummers um actors uh we bring students out to um The Mark Twain House the Wadsworth Atheneum the bushnel playhouse on Park so that they have experiences in the community as well as experiences in their own schools um what we're talking about here is programming that the schools have asked for in addition to what they're
134already getting they have special funding from either the commissioner's Network or the magnet schools and they have chosen to um uh ask for additional Arts programming for their students in some cases it's enrichment programming in other cases it's after school programming thank you for sharing that any other questions all right thank you very much thank you all right so the motion on the floor is that the Hartford board of education authorize the superintendent to execute a contract with Hartford performs in the amount of $ 58,60 for the term outlined in the contract ending June 30th 2025 all those in favor signify by saying I I I I nay abstentions the eyes have it the motion moves All Right Moving On item 4.3 second reading and adoption harassment policy motion that the Hartford board of education
135adopt policy 41181 one3 harassment Personnel do I have a motion so move second all right uh board member Fortune I'll turn it over to you uh I'll provide a summary of the harassment policy um uh in short the cab audit um as our board chair mentioned before cab is the Connecticut Association of boards of Education um so they audited our high SCH Public Schools policies and they identified the staff harassment policy as one that needs to be reviewed and revised um so the revisions um in front of you the proposed policy the primary changes include a language from the C model policy on who the policy should apply to currently it's staff board parents vendors volunteers and visitors on District property or participating in District activity um it removes language on protected classes because the
136harassment policy applies to all and Hartford Public Schools has a separate anti-discrimination policy that identifies protected classes relative to discrimination it refines the definition of harassment and includes bullying in the language of the policy note that the staff conduct policy is a separate policy from the district policies and uh and on student there's a different student harassment policy thank you any questions comments or discussion all right seeing none um the motion on the floor is that the Hartford board of education adopt policy 41181 one3 harassment Personnel all those in favor signify by saying I I I nay abstentions the eyes haveit the motion moves item 4.4 second reading and adoption code of ethics motion that the Hartford board of education adopt policy 2300 code of ethics do I have a motion so move second all
137right uh I will pass it back to board member Fortune uh like the prior policy the cave audit of our policies identified that we did not have a separate code of ethics policy so this uh this proposed policy simply identifies that all HPS employees are to be held um to the city of hartford's code of ethics um and this was preferred instead of having a long policy that essentially copies the city's policy this says that we are now going to be abiding by the Hartford um by the city's policy which is what we've been doing all along thank you any questions comments or discussion yeah one question um should the city revise its policy or its code of ethics rather um would ours still refer to the new version of the city's policy or are
138we adopting the code of ethics policy as it stands now I will let Deputy Foster take this one good evening um yeah so our intent in in adopting the policy in this way is that if the city does change the code of ethics we wouldn't have to come back to to change the policy that we we were just going to follow excuse me we're going to follow the city's policy or excuse me the city's code of ethics for employees and if they change it that will just automatically apply to us okay thank you any other questions comments would we have to vote on that no just it just automatically so if they decided to change it and we had some question on as a board we have to vote on that that's I guess my
139question based on how we brought it forward to you we we went back and forth right so the other option was to for example take the current city code of ethics and adopt that wholesale it's lengthy and we just felt like let's just say we're going to follow what the city says is the code of ethics for city employees um the alternative option would be for us to adopt either our own that's our own language or adopt the exact language of the city code at this moment and if we did that then if they changed theirs we would have to consider whether we want to change ours thanks for the clarification and yeah if I may part of why I'm asking is this board has already been in a situation where what was referenced in
140the city Charter and in our bylaws you know right now what it is here is that we're adopting the city of Hartford Municipal Code chapter 2 article uh Roman numerals 19 it's possible that the numbering might change and it might no longer live there and things like that over years you know um so I I would just flag that in the event that we need to keep current thank you for clarifying that the intention is to adopt any revisions that are made and I guess that then that would behoove us to make sure that we're keeping track of whether the city is revising that policy um but just something to note so that we avoid yeah conflicting references in in these documents yeah and I think our goal is to sort of regularly review all
141our policies and then you know we do sometimes bring things to the board that are sort of essentially numbering changes and so we would have to keep on top of that for [Music] sure uh thank you so much for the sake of transparency should there be any changes or proposed changes on the city's level that will be brought to our attention correct we certainly can do that if you if that's the wish of the board yeah absolutely yes I mean I I can't speak for everyone but I would think that I think what would be really important too what I'm also hearing is that if there are changes to the city like to if there are changes to the municipal code that it sounds like we also might want to have like if that changes
142then we should know about it this has shifted and this is what the this is what the language said and this is what the new language has I think that's going to be really important H we stay on top of it right so if there's big critical changes we know that they happened yeah all right um so the motion on the floor is that the Hartford board of education adopt policy 2300 code of ethics all those in favor signify by saying I I nay abstentions all right the eyes have it the motion moves item 4.5 second reading and adoption naming of facilities or parts of facilities motion that the Hartford board of education adopt policy 355 naming of facilities or parts of facilities policy do I have a motion so moved second all right uh
143before I turn it over to miss forun I just want to remind everyone this is just the policy on the renaming of a school in general not a specific school that we're talking about tonight so with that uh Miss Fortune thank you madam chair um this uh change in policy did not come through um through a c audit uh this is uh us choosing to revise the policy in part to a am I loud in part um because of a request to rename a school and we decided before addressing that request we should update our policy to reflect um the wishes of the current board the key changes uh perhaps the biggest change is um a a revision that a school can be named after someone who is alive the current policy um prior to
144this revision said a school could only be named after an individual who is deceased um and then there's some other uh changes some clarification as to the criteria for an individual after whom a school can be named what is expected from an applicant who is applying to rename a school whether it's after an individual or um some other name that is not a specific individual um and some changes in the timeline for the board once we receive a request to streamline that and make a decision thank you any questions discussions comments no all right seeing none uh the motion on the floor is that the Hartford board of education adopt policy 3505 naming of facilities or parts of facilities policy all those in favor signify by saying I I nay abstentions the eyes have it
145the motion moves I item 4.6 second reading and adoption 2025 2026 and 2026 2027 District calendar motion that the Hartford board of education adopt The District calendars for 2025 2026 and 2026 2027 do I have a motion so move do I have a second second all right I will pass it back to Dr torz Rodriguez thank you um and chief Barney and deputy Dr rattley if you're here um to answer um questions but I do just want to um give some overview uh right the current calendar reduced the number of half days by three in comparison to the 2425 calendar uh the team continues to have a focus on increasing educator capacity through professional learning especially as we think about the reduction in instructional coaches who previously provided more of a job in embedded professional
146learning um to to our Educators so that that's still in the back of our of our mind and essentially some of the key highlights in in the ones that the calendars that you see before you um for we submitting two calendars this time 25 26 26 27 and there's been a reduction of the four half days in the original the initial uh draft to two half days at the start of the school year across all grades and um in the event of snow days right that that the snow days shorten the number of teacher work dayss required by the hft contract a teacher work day will then be added at the uh end of the school year so that we can maintain the Integrity uh and compliance of the 190 day uh requirement so I'll
147pause there because I know you might have specific questions just wanted to give you like the high level overview any questions or comments discussion yeah go ahead so as I'm looking at the calendar here um I see that we would be starting next year on the 20th and would not be leaving until the 17th is that not what it is no so um so actually the um the 20th is the start for teachers okay yes for the professional learning on the 26 good question though thank you it's a week shorter if if you look at the green the green bar um first day of school August 27th and this is just want to clarify this is not usually the outfacing view this is what we see behind um the scenes and you all see the
148one that has the list on the bar on the right so thank you for clarifying um I just wanted to make sure that we're not going to school earlier and being released later any other questions or comments um the superintendent if you could just clarify I know we said the first two days of school are half days can you just make it clear for everyone that the first day only applies to certain grades and which grades those are specifically August 26th yes team if you can speak to the transition days that we're now hoping um actually to extend everyone yes so the uh decision was made to have every everyone return on the 26th and the 27th prek through 12 yes and then what we would do is we would utilize um a lot of
149the lessons that we learned from the transition Day last year since we it did improve our intendance and engagement um to look at how we can best support all of the grades so what does that look like um with the lessons that um we did last year around social emotional learning community building one of the other things that was highlighted from the transition day is that school use schools utilize the other part of the day to do family engagement events which um received a lot of positive feedback so seeing is that the hft contract now allows for two family engagement events how do we utilize that first half day back to do family engagement events across the District why are we um voting on two years now yeah for more consistency um and kind of
150forecasting out okay I'll just say one thing that I do like about this board is that we take a year at a time like with our contracts um with everything um so this just doesn't seem to be in line with that that's just my comment um first regarding the transition day is the plan like we're voting on adopting this and it is labeled transition day day is the plan to continue to call it a transition day or are we thinking of adopting different language and part of why I asked the question right is that um the idea of a transition day for specific grades has been around and I now if you're going to call it a transition you know I we all assumed I think that that meant that there would be specific grades
151attending and other grades not attending you'll have to work to make sure that the community understands and that families understand that everyone comes on transition day because that's a change from past practice um so just to clarify like we're approving this and it will be called a transition day recognizing that we'll have to work to combat some of how people usually understood that term yeah I think we have to be explicit about um what it is what's going to happen on that day yes um on a similar note 1B uh I think the idea of the snow day makeup day um in past practice has meant something different because it now on this calendar is scheduled as a professional development day and the superintendent clarified the intention to have staff make up that professional learning
152day at the end of the year if they lose that day due to the students making up a snow day that they would then not have to make up so it it treats the staff and the students somewhat different ly with regard to the idea of a snow day makeup day um or a built-in snow day as as it had existed in in past practice so just clarifying that I think will be important um my last uh comment or question is um less about the content and more about the process um you know this draft calendar the the the first draft calendar uh was presented first at the family Community engagement committee meeting on February 6th then went to the board meeting on February 18th the teaching and learning committee saw it on February 26th
153and then they went back to the family and Community engagement meeting uh on March 6th where every step along the way we heard about the feedback that was given through the process that you went through um and yet at each step along the way no revisions were presented for comment until a couple of days AO ago when the board was sent uh re revisions I guess my question is is that how you intended the revision process to go based on the impact that you received or was there some breakdown an adjustment had to be made in the process of collecting feedback and and revising the original draft yes thank you for the question actually in taking all of the feedback from the various stakeholders it wasn't as clean as just going to a group or
154a set of people or a committee there were various teams going out to ensure for instance that we yielded more parent intake or in in voice in stakeholder voice also to make sure that we went back to all of the groups that we had already communicated with and so it may appear as though you know 9th hour adjustments but that clearly was not the case it was just we were collecting all of this information to ensure we could get the best form before you that really yielded the voice of not only external stakeholders internal stakeholders and of course this board does that answer your question sir it it's an answer I'm I'm kind of like wrapping my head around it a little bit um what I'm hearing from your from your answer is that the
155process worked and that the late revision after been presented several times the same draft was part of the process um and I guess by way of comment I would just say that a lot of what I've heard about the process of developing this calendar is that it was much more collaborative and um involved more stakeholders in decision- making about about the calendar um which I think is great from my perspective just one Delta to the process was that we didn't see revisions being made along on the way as that feedback was being collected or or just didn't understand that the plan was always to make an adjustment before the final vote based on that feedback so just some tightening up of of that revision process next time around which I guess you know I hope
156and and it you shared at the initial presentation that there is some intention to look back at the end of next year and just see how it went um if any changes should be made um I guess that would have to be brought back to the board I that time to miss Brody's Point um about reviewing things year by year um so maybe maybe we can revisit that and then um if it if it all goes well which I hope it will um just being mindful of of if we're doing the work to engage stakeholders being clear about how the revision process works thank you just a suggestion um for uh next year I it can always be uh something on on the committee level to just check in as to the calendar even though
157what you approve two calendars today uh potentially that you always do a check in and see if there's things that have changed that require um that you change um along the long along the lines of what the superintendent says my question was going to be it looks like you guys did a really great job collecting data from last year about transition day which informed the calendar that you've presented to us as we collect more data the next academic year if you could present that to us to see if it informs perhaps revising the 26 27 school year calendar as well that'd be great thank you um U yeah I just wanted to I think you know you you did what you know you did the process you had the revisions I think would be helpful
158in the future kind of to what some folks are saying to have it a little bit in advance so that can ask questions and see if like just sort of see that things have shifted but I also understand that we were also making revisions in the moments out of making the plane and flying it so I understand that but in the future it will be helpful to get those revisions in advance so that we have time to ask questions and have a thorough understanding of what that looks like and I'm in curious because I know part of the conversation we had last time is you all wanted also to get more parent engagement how was that process did you get more parent engagement how many more or like what was that process for you all
159in terms of going back to those stakeholders I will add that this was actually open the door to a process that could help us even with future um efforts to engage families and that we essentially just put boots on ground and started calling Families First asking if they had taken the survey um our strategic Partnerships team through fcsps reached out directly to families um being able to touch more than 170 families in about less than two days um and with that teasing out those who had already answered the um the parent Square survey just getting a better idea of how do they adjust or how do they um have or or make sure that or ensure that they have child care some of those questions that came up so it was really eye openening but
160I think for us as a team uh Beyond just simply sending out the parent Square survey really putting boots on the ground to get closer to our families and just ask those questions in a more intimate setting to get a clearer picture of exactly how we could shape future proposals for many different areas not just the calendar thank you very much for that Clarity I love the idea of boots on the ground and being able to that that Outreach because that's really where we're going to get the most information and the most um you know interaction so I appreciate you all doing that sorry one more question and one more comment the comment first as we're rolling out the final calendars could we also emphasize to families and parents and Guardians that the school day
161is being shortened by 30 minutes and what the new hours will be because I'm not sure how much that's been communicated or how much parents have picked up on the change um so I think while we're rolling out a calendar with a transitional day of first day if we could just tell them all of these calendar changes at one time that would be great so people can plan their lives um that'd be great and then the question um is is really along the lines of the Outreach that you've done reaching 170 families in two days um I guess for my own knowledge I'm curious to know what really was the Tipping Point for changing from four half days to two half days which I know I was personally strongly a can especially from you know
162as a parent with three young kids will all be in Herford Public Public Schools what what was it was it that changed uh prompted you to consider and and change from four half days to two half days that first week of school there were a few things we'd heard um not only from the presentation but then also from some other parents who contacted us directly um but looking at our professional development plan and getting a little tighter around what it is that we need to do at the start of the year and just rethinking how might we be able to do this to best take care of adults as well as take care of our students and our families and so just kind of going back and forth with that and just thinking through particularly
163our professional development um planning for next year where we might be able to reshape some things where it doesn't require the four different half days thank you I I appreciate that can I just um extend the question a little further could you just share a few examples of what we actually heard from families um just to kind of give voice absolutely so a few things that we heard specifically around child care that uh some have neighbors or family members that take care of the children on the half days a few families said that they take their children to work um that they um don't have child care they rely on some of the um the after school kind of programming and so even though the the numbers the way they looked it appeared that the
164majority were able to handle um after school care doesn't rest lightly on us that we still have families who may not be able to so that will even encourage some of the work we're doing around with our partners to see if we can secure some sort of um after school support knowing that there would be funding implications but in some way just to offer up that additional support for our families to um have that child care thank you Dr rley just wanted to um right just share all right seeing and hearing no other questions um the motion on the floor is that the Hartford board of education adopt The District calendars for 2025 2026 and 2026 2027 all those in favor signify by saying I I I I nay abstentions the eyes have it the
165motion moves we now move on to the consent agenda the items on the consent agenda are as follows CL um first reading bullying prevention and intervention uh as a quick reminder these are just first readings so we're just uh announcing them that we will be discussing them in committee so we won't have discussion on them tonight uh so the first reading on bullying and prevention intervention this policy is being revised because the new state law legislation mandating that all districts adopt a safe School climate plan as a board policy the proposed changes bring the existing bullying prevention and intervention policy into alignment with the safe schools climate plan under the new legislation primary changes to be aligned with state law include updating the definition of bullying including the word alleged when discussing the policy response
166to acts of bullying so instead of Acts of bullying it will read alleged acts of bullying uh 5.3 first reading District safe School climate and bullying Plan a state law passed in a previous legislative session requires all Connecticut Boards of Education adopt a district safe schools climate policy plan as policy the legislation stipulates adoption of the cave model plan HPS already has an existing SCA safe School climate plan but it will sorry it is getting very late but it was an operation plan rather than a board policy the proposed policy is the cave model policy adopted to include language consistent with the HPS bullying prevention and intervention policy there's no red line because this is a new policy for HPS a 5.4 first reading homeless students the cab audit of HPS policies identified that HPS
167does not have a board policy relative to homeless students the proposed policy is the cave model policy HPS proposes adopting all the optional language in the cab model policy during the policy committee there was a discussion of whether to use the word homeless or a word unhoused in the policy staff researched current language and found that the Connecticut Department of Education uses homeless education when describing expectations for districts and use of federal mckin vento funds the city of Hartford has a commission on homelessness supported by the housing division of the development services department so again these are first readings and they will be discussed again at the policy committee providing another opportunity for feedback before coming back next month for adoption of 5.5 is approval of the minutes from the February 18th 2025 meeting are
168there any comments or questions on the consent agenda okay all right seeing none do I have a motion to vote on the consent agenda so move second it all right all those in favor signify by saying I I I nay extensions the eyes have it all right um we will now head into executive session to discuss the collective bargaining agreements um with the Hartford Federation of school secretaries and the Hartford Federation of school police officers we will be taking with us Melinda Kaufman laori missak Paul Foster and Dr Tores Rodriguez do I have a motion to enter executive session so move second all right all those in favor signify by saying I I I I uh nay extensions the eyes have it thank you we will be back to vote on these um on these
169agreements when we're done [Music] [Applause] [Music] n [Music] [Applause] [Music] n [Music] was [Music] e [Music] n [Music] n [Music] n [Music] oh [Music] n [Music] e [Music] for [Music] m [Music] e [Music] h [Music] no [Music] oh [Music] w [Music] a [Music] m [Music] n [Music] n e [Music] one [Music] yeah was great [Music] [Applause] [Music] e [Music] he [Music] [Applause] [Music] you e doubtful yes you hear them okay believe first we need a motion to come out of executive session so moved second all those in favor signify by saying i i i n exensions eyes have all right thank you all um so up first is the approval of the proposed colle collective bargaining agreement with the Hartford Federation of school secretaries motion that the Hartford board of education approve the proposed collective
170bargaining agreement with the Hartford Federation of school secretaries local 1100 AF CIO do I have a motion second all those in favor signify by saying I I I nay abstentions right the eyes have it last but not least the approval of the proposed collective bargaining agreement with the Hartford Federation of school special police officers motion that the Hartford Board of Education approved the proposed collective bargaining agreement with the Hartford Federation of school special police officers local 108d AF AFL cioo do I have a motion so move second all those in fav favor signify by saying I I nay extensions the eyes have it the March 18th Board of Education meeting is adjourned thank you for joining us good night e