001I was to say with this many students I should have done the Clapping instead of the the you know um but uh I just wanted to say it's 7:01 um I going to call the Board of Education meeting to order and ask people to stand to say the Pledge of Allegiance thank you uh next up is our public hearing and first up to speak are our Student Government Representatives I don't know if I see Rocky or here here oh there you are you were hiding back the room's so full tonight welcome good evening uh members of the Board of Education Dr Jones and esteemed community members as always it's great to be here to share some updates about student government and our efforts to improve the Comm School Community last week Mahir and I met
002with Mr Silman to discuss the future direction of the student government um and our organizational structure we recognize the importance of involving the subcommittee chairs more extensively in the decision-making processes as they are more intimately connected with their specific policy areas and the students that are passionate about these topics as as a result we have decided to Institute a new monthly meeting that will include only the student body president vice president and the subcommittee chairs similar to a cabinet meeting we are scheduled to hold our first session next week and are hopeful that the future student body leadership will will continue with this practice additionally at our recent ghs executive committee lunch meeting Mrs stow and Dr Jones were able to share some details about the BET's budget decision-making process and possible impacts on our
003school Community um Beyond fewer teachers and class options we learned that learn learning resources like textbooks and Technology could be impacted along with professional development Endeavors that strengthen our teachers abilities all of XCOM and The Wider class representatives plan to speak at the BET's public comment on the 26th to express our concerns about growing class sizes and fun electives to explore our diverse interests thank you for your time and we're excited to share updates again at the next Boe meeting thanks Rocky is me here here uh no I don't see him online either so if he shows up hopefully we'll have an opportunity to hear from him as well um so moving on to GAA I know I saw little back there somewhere good evening Dr Jones Board of red ghs teachers community members like
004to make just a brief comment um on agenda item number four curriculum discussion uh GAA surveyed teachers at ghs about midterm and final exams 166 teachers who responded included all subject areas school counselors electives teachers from inros the questions asked was in your professional judgment and experience as a high school teacher which protocol should ghs follow for midterms finals 95% of the teachers who responded wanted to keep midterm and finals exams as part of the calcul ation for course grades with more than 80% wanting to maintain the waiting system as it is for 20242 and was for decades before the covid shutdown some teachers even asked for higher weighted percentages like to share just a few comments from the teachers with you all um if our students are experiencing stress around these exams the best
005way we can support their growth is to help them learn strategies to lessen their stress seeing and studying for a presentation of the content in a cumulative way deepens overall understanding and assigns meaning to the broad interconnections of content referring to the vision of The Graduate I believe that midterms and final exams demonstrate how our students are able to critically interpret evaluate synthesize information and respond to failures and successes with reflection and resilience these exam grades are also a good source of information as counselors work with students during course selection and a strong long midterm final grade can indicate that a student might be ready for more rigorous level while a weaker grade May indicate that a student may not be ready for the course I also oh my phone just went up sorry um
006like to comment and congratulate um Mr Deo sorry my back is to you all um Mr Reed Tera Fogle and um and burn math cordor science coordinator Tara and Mike for math um I looked at your presentation great K12 stem update on their progress and achievement and successes quite impressive ter your goal three Mastery of science surpasses 24 goals in all three grade levels of measurement and are on Pace to meet our 2025 goals Greenwich High School science department exceeded a 20 28 Target of approximately 86% of our students at or above level and all three all great increases in grade 11 and 12 congratulations to you all great job um and of course all the math and science and classroom teachers who make their lessons fun relevant with real world applications and for all
007my ga teachers who show up every day and are here to serve our students thank you all thanks Lil um I see me here come on up sorry I'm late it's okay hello chair hir Dr Jones and members of the board and uh happy belated St Patrick's Day my name is Mahir and I'm the student body vice president at grench high school and I'm be happy to be back with you tonight this month was another great month especially for class events and fundraising at the high school starting off the Freshman held a bake sale and they raised a solid amount of money and it created a precedent where they will continue to grow their fundraising presence the sophomores are busy at work planning a Jeopardy event for their class on our school's sat day next
008Wednesday where all 10th graders are welcome to compete on top of this they're hoping up plan a townwide 5K walk run this spring the Juniors led a successful pday fundraiser selling the ability to pie a teacher including officer Wallace Mr silkman and Mr Pereira finally we seniors held our annual tradition the crispy K cream fundraiser sadly for the last time it was a great success raising over $1,000 as for our Student Government goals from our Mass meetings our Student Center and environment subcommittee will recommend updating a few flags hanging in the student center to ensure nations are AC accurately represented in our Student Center our food service committee gathered valuable responses from students in our food service form which will help to add more protein options and healthier snacks as well as supporting our stanions
009in our cafeteria finally our community service subcommittee has established a date and will host a community service fair for all Greenwich high school students to collect student Vol connect student volunteers with local nonprofits this will happen at the end of April on the 24th in the media center thank you for allowing me to update the board on all that's going on at ghs I will be back next month with more great news thank you thanks here um next up is our uh president of PTA Council and before you take this this you know the mic I was just going to say I see a lot of parents and other students standing outside I know that we're in a smaller space than usual but come on in there's plenty of space in here even if there
010aren't necessarily chairs we'd love to be able to see your faces there's there's one chair there okay there you go take it away jump people are afraid of me apparently uh chair H Boe members superintendent Dr Jones everyone here and everyone online thank you for this opportunity to speak I'm John fiser the grenwich PTA council president parent of two of the 8,533 great kids in the grenwich public schools PTA council is the umbrella organization of the 15 independent ptas in town we have just under 4,000 PTA families in Greenwich who invest more than one and a quarter million dollars and hundreds and hundreds of volunteer hours every year to enhance the learning experience of every student and to support our teachers and our schools it's the home stretch in the budget Marathon we appreciate all
011the effort and time by the administration and the Boe members for the benefit of everyone listening and everyone here the next step in the budget process is the full bet public hearing on the school's budget next Wednesday March 26 7 PM Central Middle School the BET public hearing is the main stage event be there to watch the show if that's your style and be there to speak if that's your style we also urge Boe members and especially the budget committee members to speak out at the BET budget committee decision day there were things said it was said the BET members thought the Boe should do more analysis on the budget before bringing the budget to the bet no one other than the Boe budget committee members can know how much time and Analysis you put
012in but I'm about 99% sure it was as much as necessary and possible and that it was diligent and that it's the right siiz budget and we urge you to speak out on that it was said that there was a decline in enrollment of 143 students the Boe knows that number is the difference between projected numbers and actual enrollment but actual enrollment decline was about a 100 and enrollment is possibly going up next year and we urge the Boe to speak out on that it was said that there are 24 or 25 new FTE in the budget the Boe knows there are really only 8.8 new positions four related to increasing p prek and special ed enrollments and the rest for the new positive Pathways program we urge you to speak out on that a
013motion was made to cut $250,000 from the budget referencing the new positive Pathways program but in Boe discussions you called out that program as one of the smartest investments in the budget we urge you to speak out on that it's been said that percentage increase in the budget is too big but Boe knows contractual Sal salary costs alone with grade and step increases are more than the total budget increase put forward in the BET guidelines we we urge you to speak out on that what's more the GPS budget increase is not excessive at last at less than 5.1% the budget increase is actually lower than State average increase which is 5.41% and the median increase 5.31% across and those averages and those medians are across all the other school districts in Connecticut as documented by
014the ass Association of school business officials with that I'm going to turn quickly to the agenda we note the discussion items on the ghs pool and the ghs curriculum uh and we uh we seem those seem to be destined for angst and contention we look forward to hearing about graduation day and the last day of school as we imagine everyone does uh with that I'd like to close by thank thanking you for your public service and thanking you for this opportunity to speak thank you for your thoughtful words as always Sean um so next up is community comments and I'm going to turn the mic over to our secretary but before I do so um as long as it's okay we have a few students that had signed up to speak um I'd like to
015ask if it was okay for them to go first so that they can get back home to do homework uh or you know whatever else that they need to do for school for tomorrow so um you want to call these students first if we are I giving the students the first crack at it the first student speaker is Connor McMahon there are three minutes to speak and and I will give you a 30 second warning so that if if there's more to say you could summarize thank you good evening my name is Conor McMahon and I'm a sophomore at grenwich high school I'm a varsity swimmer on the boys swim and dive team as well as a swimmer on the Greenwich YWCA Dolphins club team I Rise to speak out against the possible ghs pool
016closure because it will be disastrous for all of the aquatics teams in town but especially the Greenwich High boys and girls swim and dive teams and the boys and girls water polo teams our swim team practices six days a week in that pool during the season it which begins in early December and round until the end of March with over 40 athletes on the boys swimming dive teams pool time is already hard to come by and is sagger between the G JV and varsity as well as the dive team it is one of few competition pools in Fairfield County and we host the majority of the swim meets for that reason the ghs pool is also used in the winter by the Greenwich dolphins for National level practices and host several important Town meets such
017as the grenwich town Championship to say that the pool is heavily used as an understatement we need this pool and cannot toward any decreased pool time I urge you to find a solution so that our teams will not face any interruptions during the critical fall winter and spring aquatic Seasons thank you thank you Connor the next uh student we have is Haden wood hello and good evening all my name is Haden wood I'm a senior captain of the gr High School boys swim team and I've come in front of you today to express my concern for the future pool plans I've been swimming in the chhs pool since I was nine it has served as a second home for me and I've seen firsthand the impact it has had on my teammates and the community
018who comes together in it I understand that some parts of the facility need repair but shutting down the pool for one to two years at minimum would be catastrophic to all of our Aquatics teams in case you don't know the ghs pool is home to the most decorated High School sports team in Connecticut grch High School boys swiming swim the dive team it's also home to the championship winning boys and girls water polo teams as well as the championship winning girls swim team a long-term shutdown with disrupt training and eliminate home meets and games including the Cardinal tournament for the boys Polo team and FCX for both the boys and girls swim teams on top of that for athletes pursuing college recruitment which is a relatively large portion of all the aquatics teams losing a
019home facility would deeply impact their performance and exposure in the fall we have two teams both using the pool combining to be roughly 60 70 people in the wi in the winter roughly 40 and in the spring roughly 30 each team needs consistent times location and space to train without a home pool our training will be scattered inconsistent and potentially inefficient and our Aquatics team success may fall finding nearby nearby facilities to hold such a large number of people on such a consistent basis to uphold the high level and quality of training that makes our Aquatics teams so successful may be hard to find and simply not realistic instead of a full shutdown I know that together we can find a way to work out a phase renovation plan that would keep our pool operational
020and allow us for our training to continue the GTS pool is more than just a place to swim it's where Champions are made and lifelong memories are formed without the swim team I wouldn't be half the man I am today it shap my wor work ethic buildt my confidence and given me a second family for the aquatics seems to thrive we need our pool please consider the impact you're having on hundreds of athletes and the ghs Aquatics Legacy before shutting down our pool thank you um our first adult speaker is uh James Waters all right um good evening members of the Board of Ed um it's good to see you all tonight um and as always thank you for your service to the town um my my name is James Waters and most of you
021know me as chairman of the RTM budget overview committee and chairman of the old grenage school building committee um tonight I speak as an individual about the granch high school pool the details in the report that you have are disturbing it looks like a thorough renovation or a new Cardinal Pool is going to be required to many in our Town's Aquatics Community this reports an an inflection point for good or for bad for some of our Town's most successful programs tonight you have an opportunity for leadership a chance to begin to address a clear problem an opportunity to set an example for how the town handles emerging situations that impact thousands of kids across Generations there are clear risks in being too hasty or not Hasty enough our ghs Aquatics teams are consistently some of
022the best in the entire School they've won scores of County and state championships scores thousands have benefited tremendously as people and students because of the excellent Aquatics programs that's been the case for decades despite safely working out of a substandard facility make no mistake being too hasty tonight will impact that you see that here around us tonight I urge you to pursue a balanced path establish a special committee to guide your decision-making a credible grp group needs to go through this report in depth and recommend a course of action before school opens this fall having read the report in its entirety the problems are clear and potentially major but it's equally clear we don't yet understand the adjacent impacts and that more we work needs to be done to decide what to do ESP special
023committee can plug the gaps consider stakeholder input flesh out the options in the scope generate conceptual designs and understand costs and funding options the reports a start but you need more to handle this right a focus group is critical I'll volunteer tonight for this effort and I know many others will too assuming we get this group in place now I think we can answer many of these questions before school opens this fall let's let's please head in that direction tonight it would be disappointing to see this deferred to a future meeting or to make a rash decision based on incomplete information thanks for your consideration and please count me into help our next speaker is Terry L not to John members of the board I'm Terry L I have been the swimming coach at Gran
024High School for 57 years I also started the water polo program in 1975 and coached that team for 40 years I've literally spent Decades of my life at the ghs pool unfortunately the report that is being presented tonight was made without anyone once speaking with me or any swimming diving or water polo coach or teacher after more than five Decades of service I would like to think that my experience and expertise is of some value in these discussions instead historically projects are undertaken without consulting coaches and mistakes have been made most recently over the past three years all are part of our pool deck has been replaced twice one mistake replacing another as a report indicates there is pooling due to uneven application but moreover the surface is Slippery When Wet coaches now have developed
025squeegee skills to minimize the problem despite the problem with the new pool that the grch high school pool is actually the Envy of nearly every team and we face with its starting blocks at the deep end moved three decades ago for safety reasons after several years of my request to former facilities managers it now has the safest and best starting depth of any pool in the state visiting divers love our incredibly safe diving area with deeper water than many pools in the state and it's high ceiling height which meets National High School Federation rules in fact contrary to the statement in the report the world's number one manufacturer of diving boards sold the school a new board just two years ago the diving area meeting their requirements as for the beam cited in the document
026beyond the pl Zone though I'm not normally there for diving practice I know that only one way that even Olympic divers could touch that beam is to treat the board like a trampoline jumping in such a way that no diver would ever do for an actual dive we need to make sure that divers know that that that practice is banned supervision of pools is mandatory and necessary to keep swimmers divers and water polo players safe this is true true and even the newest and fanciest pools we can and must make sure the pool equipment is used safely the beam location is such that it will forever be yards away from any actual dive even for the All-American divers that our team traditionally has as for currs about the deck yes our deck space is shared
027by the athletes and our Spectators this is true for all the sites of every state divisional trials and finals held within the last week it is also the case for the much newer GR YMCA pool the original 1960s plan for the ghs pool had a separate diving balcony a separate spectator balcony Cuts after bids for the pool came in nearly 50% over original estimates made that the balcony be cut from the plans would have been nice to have it the narrow deck on the north side of the pool having been on the building committee for the 1997 renovation I can tell you that it took a request to the state for variance of the required deck width to get approval for the width of these existing deck it is a low traffic area opposite The
028Spectator bleaches and has created no problem 30 seconds moreover the 1997 renovation included lighting that was like a sunny day due to the replacement valves in the over the pool the new lighting was replaced recently that the ghf pool remains as the pool with the brightest lighting of any pool in which we compete including those used for state championship meets although the computer scoreboard stand is not ADA Compliant if there there were a need an extension cord could bring the computer system down to the often used deck level scoring table in essence the pool both for swimming and Diving is functional and safe to be used for whatever period is required for the development of proposal and construction of a replacement and it must be done without interruption to our highly successful Aquatics programs there
029is much in this document that needs to be discussed the ghs coaches are ready and willing to engage in a thorough and thoughtful discussion of how we can continue to plan for the future while also continuing to allow ghs athletes to compete at the highest level thank you for your consider our next speaker is Mike McMahon after you is Jan man it's a family affair good evening everyone um my name is Janet McMahon I think most of you on that side of the table uh know me but for those who of you who don't I'm speaking tonight as a parent of two competitive swimmers one of whom is currently a swimmer that spoke earlier of the grenwich high school boys swim and dive team and a daughter who will be on the Greenwich High School
030girlss swim team in a year and a half my kids also swim for the YWCA Dolphins club swim team while I'm a member of the RTM in District 8 as well as a delegate to the RTM education committee and Pac facilities chair the views expressed tonight are my own I'm deeply disturbed by the suggestion that the Greenwich High School pool be closed for any length of time but the one to two years as recommended in the capital requests is a non-starter any closure of any length from September through June would be extremely detrimental to all Club Aquatics teams in town but especially the girls the grenwich high school boys and girls swim dive and water polo teams the GH the ghs boys and girls swim dive and water polo teams all use the pool heavily
031from September through June these are Elite championship teams with the boys swim and dive team having just won its 54th FCX last week and 49th LLS on Tuesday they're the most decorated High School athletic team in Connecticut and some would argue in the country in addition the grenwich Dolphins another Elite swim team rents out the GH ghs pool for practices from November through March the Dolphins is a nationally ranked club team that has produced alumni participating in many Olympic trials these high performing athletes cannot afford to lose any pool time I urge you to consider not doing any pool pool Renovations during September through June and closing the pool for the summer months only I'm also concerned that I'm only now hearing about the apparent pool issues despite being an education committee Delegate for eight
032years and Pac facilities chairwoman for the past two years I consider myself pretty well informed on Town capital projects and issues but was completely blindsided by this especially given that the pool recently underwent some repairs this past summer why weren't some or any of these issues addressed then why are the aquatics parents only now hearing about this and not in the fall of 2024 when the issues allegedly began why is this being considered in emergency even though many of these issues have existed since 1997 almost 30 years ago with no real injury or harm while I agree that the pool issues may may be should be addressed I remain 30 seconds I remain unconvinced that it is an emergency and a pool shut down outside of September through June must be avoided at all costs
033if it cannot be avoided then a backup pool plan must be put forward for all of the affected teams and clubs again shutting the pool down without any plan would be negligent and devastating to all of the aquatics teams in town thank you for your consideration go Big Red and go Dolphins our next speaker is Michelle bukara good evening board members thanks for the opportunity to speak um my name is Michelle b car and I'm parent of two sons uh who been part of the ghs boys swim and dive team for the past six years um and plan to be next year as well uh the swim program's been a critical component of both myson's abilities to fully participate in ghs is Mission it's through this this program that they have truly learned and lived
034what personal integrity and interpersonal responsibility are all about I'm sure that the other parents would agree that that's pretty likely for their kids as well I'm thankful to ghs and to coach low for providing them this crucial opportunity continued operation of this program is not only important to us and our kids personal development and well-being but I believe is also very important to the school as well to help it achieve its Mission the boys swim and TI dive team represents and I'm not the first one to say this arguably the most successful team at ghs led by the most successful coach in the state and I would argue much broader than that I just don't have the facts um there have been uh they've been first or second place at the state compet level from
035what I can tell every year since 1969 with over 200 All American swimmers since 1970 it's truly an unbelievable record and I don't believe that any other team can claim that I'd ask that the board works to identify a plan that does not limit our kids ability to participate and compete in a way that's convenient for anyone who wishes to be a part of the team and does not limit anyone because of financial ability to travel to some other random location I'd ask that the that any remediation plan is focused on what truly does need to be repaired and that those remediations take place in the offseason of other as others have said so that the kids can continue to participate in the programs on site during the season there's no one who knows that
036pool better than coach low so I ask that we defer to coach's judgment on what the plan really should be thank you for your time our next speaker is Elizabeth de Haven good evening Dr Jones cherisher chair you know I look just like him don't you um and other board members and everyone here um I'm Elizabeth The Haven I'm the very proud aunt of three Cardinal Aquatics participants and Mom of an incoming Cardinal aquatic participant hopefully from Western Middle School I'm here tonight to support everything that has been said before me as well as make some comments on behalf of my sister-in-law Cara Mendelson Cara has a son who is a senior a daughter who's a junior and a daughter who is a freshman at ghs all of them are swimmers and water Poole players
037and she is just here to say how wonderful these teams are and how important they are to her kids the coaches are incredible and being part of the swim and water pool programs at ghs has been lifechanging for her kids and their teammates it has taught them the value of hard work and taught taught them to be resilient they love their coaches and their teammates and are always so happy after their ghs practices she's asking you to please let these programs continue for now until there's a good plan in place for these programs to be able to be continued and uninterrupted thank you our final speaker of the evening is Francis nobe uh good evening everyone I'm Francis wobbe and I'm honored to be here tonight representing a slightly different topic I'm here to present
038Girl Scouts um uh so I'll switch to that topic but thank you for for all coming out um along with Mrs uh Miss Lori Mulligan and Miss L Fitzroy we volunteer our time to run the Girl Scout program here in the town of Greenwich Girl Scouts in grenwich is a true Community effort with over 300 Girl Scouts and nearly as many Volunteers in every public and private school in town except Brunswick we're United by a shared commitment to serve others and make a positive impact in in our community Girl Scouts is about so much more than just fun and Adventure it's about building courage confidence and character and using those qualities to make the world a better place our program is open to Rising kindergarteners through grade 12 encouraging them to try new things make
039lasting friendships and explore s o l e stem the outdoors life skills and Entrepreneurship one of our most well-known entrepreneurship programs is Girl Scout cookies starting this Saturday you'll see Girl Scouts in your neighborhood earning funds for their troops and on Sunday please wave to us as we proudly March in the St Patrick's Day Parade wearing our Girl Scout green tonight I want to personally invite you to a very special event on Sunday April 6 from 2: to 4m Greenwich Girl Scouts and the League of Women Voters Greenwich will co-host our annual women in government expo at Town Hall this event is open to the public free of charge for our youngest constituents Rising kindergarteners through high school we'll be joined by some inspiring women in local government including selectwoman Raven select person McAn and
040members of the RTM bet and hopefully Boe Connecticut Secretary of State Stephanie Thomas had so much fun last year that she will stop by again this is a fantastic opportunity to learn about Civic engagement the importance of service and how we can all contribute to the betterment of our town we'd love to see you there whether as an attendee a supporter or a special guest for more information please visit bitly wig 2025 and thank you so much for all you do for our students and I see we have one more speaker who has arrived uh Julie frers from uh grenwich Alliance thank you uh good evening Dr Jones chairwoman H members of the Board of Education my name is Julie fenar and I am the executive director of the Greenwich Alliance For Education I am
041pleased to read the read the progress made in the areas of math and science and I look forward to the presentation tonight Another Science opportunity worth mentioning are the middle school science teams funded through a reaching out Grant from the Greenwich alliance with this funding Maria buano bonano expanded science teams to all three middle schools this year John lado taught the EMS who coached the em m s team uh yanu ramadas um coached the WMS team and Maria coached both the CMS and the Greenwich high school team according to Maria this level of competition in science Bowl stimulates the type of thinking coordination science strategic planning and breath of knowledge often needed in certain think onyou feet stem areas such as emergency room doctors aerospace engineers and astronauts the science team is not limited to
042to top contenders there are beginner intermediate and advanced levels of players we have an open door policy which means that anyone can be part of the team many times students enjoy being moderators scorekeepers or timekeepers during practices this year we had six teams from Greenwich um three EMS two Western Middle School one CMS and the Greenwich High School science team um earned third place CMS finished the tournament in fourth while EMS um two and M S3 finish 7th and eth respectively congratulations to all participants and coaches reaching out grants um have all been submitted to us for the 25 26 year are now in the review process by the reaching out grants committee and all applicants will be visited in the next month recommendations from the committee will be voted upon by the alliance board
043in May the alliance's beginning a strategic plan and the environmental scan was recently completed thanks to everyone who par participated in focus groups or had discussions with our Consultants as your Education Foundation we welcome additional feedback as we do our work over the next few months thank you for this opportunity to speak and see you at next week's budget meeting thank you big thank you to uh the alliance as always um next up on our agenda are monthly reports and we start with the superintendent report Dr Jones thank you chair hsh I just have a couple of items tonight first of all we are in this room tonight because CMS will be having their musical uh this weekend The Adams Family so get your tickets early because it will fill up um next week we
044have WMS which is having a Freaky Friday and again that will be in their Auditorium next weekend not this coming weekend the following the district art show also kicks off next week so you can watch for that in the Friday news um down on Greenwich Avenue on April 5th the huge day of jazz will be happening for all of our uh student musicians at the high school which is fabulous and I also just want to reiterate that next Wednesday we will be here in the auditorium for the budget hearing and that's a really really important night for the schools um but I also want to remind those of you who are used to submitting written comment the BET has just switched to an online form and so you are not supposed to email them or
045then they may not see your email so we will run that again in tomorrow's Friday news um at the online form again so thank you thank you so much for your update and I see a lot of our uh swim swimmers uh divers and you should talk about it first on the agenda heading out yeah we are I was going to remind them we are first on the agenda but if they run home now they could probably log on um but I want to thank them for all attending this evening there's still a whole uh slew of our swimmers uh in the audience I shouldn't just swimmers because there's also divers and uh water polo players so next up are the report of our officers committees and liaison does anybody have a report that they'd
046like to start with Mike I'll be brief so we can get this get back to the swimming topic but uh the want to update everybody on the Old Greenwich uh report from the old grenwich building committee we are it's very exciting time we are uh likely going out to bid um next week uh finally on that project hold April 23rd on your calendar for the groundbreaking um ceremony um and we are also in the process of the final permitting um if you have three hours uh James Waters is happy to talk you through that fascinating Pro um and all the ins and outs of going to all the different town Town departments to get sign offs on um but we're we're we're well on our way and it looks like uh we'll be uh all
047set for for full-time construction this summer on the old Manish project well that's exciting uh there any other people who the have committee updates or Le on updates anyone anyone Miss C well if you drove by um Orchard Street and saw the activity on the field you'll know that our construction and site work is underway and um it goes and fits and starts but we're on we're tracking on budget and um on time as well so I wanted to just give that update to the board thank you oh you're welcome um anyone else with the committee update leaz update no um I would say I uh sit on um the uh committee for uh for emac and uh we met last week and um I don't know went through a whole bunch of things including
048uh geothermal Wells and um all sorts of other projects solar panels or Central and Beyond and uh always happy to continue to support the work um that committee they've uh got a lot of good input um but nothing too exciting to report there yes Mike uh that was my next one um so Sophie Co and I are both sitting on the havy committee um as of now we have met uh in executive session and um spoken with indiv ual who submitted rfps um are looking to uh do some additional work to um learn a little bit more about uh some of the financial aspects um and um once uh that has been presented to uh those who the powers that be um I'll have a little bit more to share but as I said as
049of as of now we've mostly met in executive session so there's not much to share there um but certainly have consistently reminded the committee that uh as soon as we have the opportunity the board would like to get some information and uh we have a discussion of our own to have anyone else no okay with that it's what you've all been waiting for at least those who are sitting here um if there is anyone still outside there's plenty of seats come on in we're going to be talking all sorts of Aquatics so next up on our agenda our discussion items first up is the amendment to the FY 26 Capital request for the ghs pool repairs yes I know a uh and I think that is for Ben branion is he online I see him
050all right good evening everyone I'm joined by our our facilities director Dan Watson and also architect Mike uh Fortuna uh Mike will be sharing a slide deck so if I can ask Dan and Mike to go live and while they're getting ready to uh to do that uh it's a significant report uh I really encourage everyone to read it we also attempted to do a summary uh the first two pages is just an overview uh this the last time you saw this was at an oral update in February and with that I'll turn it over to Mike to go through the uh slide deck and then we can open up to the the discussion points that everyone wants to get to okay thanks Ben uh am I able to share my screen let me give
051that a shot we'll uh we'll make sure that you can hold on you should be able to for okay perfect um so thank you uh thanks for having me um I think I'm more thankful for being remote because I don't think I'm the most popular guy in grenwich right now but um I think what's important to understand in this report is that it's strictly in the context of an analysis for code um uh acceptable standards um the approv that are in place from the the um building department and the health department to the extent we can determine them um it has nothing to do with operations or uh you know it's clear that coach loow and the um the the aquatics programs are second to none and um nobody wants to see them uh have
052to take a pause in this pool um but my charge was to analyze the pool identify the issues so they can be dealt with and that's what I've attempted to do in the report um the you know the workarounds um to operate the pool safely is part of the discussion there may be ways to to mitigate risk um you know for example the the um plunger you put in to kill the pump suction if somebody were to get entrapped um that's all great um doesn't meet the code and so it was identified um you know so there's always a balance between safe operations and um full compliance and so the goal is always full compliance uh and some of these older facilities it's not always possible but that's always the goal um so that's what
053this report uh attempts to do so um we got our first look at this pool right after New Year's uh we came down uh with Connecticut Custom Aquatics who does your pool maintenance and the initial call was more of a kind of a maintenance type U look at things there was some reported leaks at the gutter line um there was some loose and broken tile and so we took a look at um the facilities group was able to get us some drawings from 97 renovation and a couple from the original Construction in the 60s so we got a good feel of how this thing was built um and basically what happened in the 90s was there was an overbuild on top of the existing pool to get the water de about a foot deeper um
054the result of that was a large curb around the perimeter of the pool and a platform where the diving board sits um and what what happens is whenever you do that is you end up with a lot of horizontal seams in the concrete there's a bent knite water stop in there that um you know bent knite is a clay material it deteriorates and dries up over time and so what's probably happening is that bent Knight is no longer swelling and stopping the leaks so leak's finding its way through the seams and out of the pool um that's not atypical um and there are different ways of addressing that um but that was the initial call was to take a look at things like that uh but then we were asked to take a full look
055in the context of the building code the health code um and the Virginia grah Baker Act um so when we took a look at the drains um so for those who were not famili with the the vgb ACT um it was enacted in 2008 after um an entrapment death in a swimming pool um it's a good law there's no question it saved lives uh but it was a bit of a a circus in 2008 because there was a mandate to update all pools across the country with a very short uh time frame to do that um Greenwich was uh kind of ahead of the curve got in there early did uh by all accounts a good job job of replacing the frames and grates in a manner that was understood to be compliant at the
056time um and in 2021 they updated the rules saying that when you replace a cover uh there's there's a whole bunch of other things that you have to do with it they call it sofa the suction Outlet fitting assembly which is the grate the frame the hardware the sump everything has to comply um and that's where you run into a little trouble with full compliance so this diagram on the right is your current setup and on the left is what would be a fully compliant sump um so that that's fixable um and uh the bigger issue is three of the four pipes that you have to these drains are completely clogged and not seeing any flow so all of your flows going through one drain um it may be possible to Route those out and
057line them uh but it's equally possible that when you route them out you blow out an elbow under the pool and then um you have no choice but to replace it so it's a it's a little bit precarious uh the other uh issue is the way the piping is arranged so this bottom diagram is the way piping and drains um are required to be configured under today's codes when you built the pool in the 60s this is how they were built so with three of these four drains clogged you're getting no flow out of the others whereas um in the in the other Arrangement the newer Arrangement um you divert flow and and you have a better chance of of maintaining flow um but the pool was designed the one of the health code requirements
058is an 8 Hour turnover and you're right at eight hours with your flow rate in a 6inch pipe which has um a 7.2 feet per second velocity which exceeds the state requirement of six feet per second so if you were to replace all this you would need to go to an 8 in pipe reconfigure the piping uh that gets you down under the um the velocity flow rate so it's kind of a long- winded way to say that even if you fix the sump you still have a drain problem or you have a piping problem so one of the things that I would advise against is fixing one thing without fixing the other because um two years from now you could have a pipe failure then every dollar you spent fixing the drain sumps um
059you're going to throw away because you're going to dig up the pipe so those are the kinds of decisions that that are going to need to be made um on how you approach this so um you know this is kind of a a major issue because there's no it's a federal law there's no state code modification process to allow this to continue it's a federal law that you have to comply with and so in some way shape or form it's an issue that needs to be dealt with in the short term um the next issue is the diving Hopper so um the state of Connecticut um going back as far as 1970s so when you built a pool in the 60s there were no building codes there was no health code related to pools um
060I think we can all confidently say it was it was code compliant because there was no code so it was built to the standards at the time but in 97 when the renovation happened um you were required to meet the State Building Code which adopted the state health code which adopted the NCAA standards for diving Hoppers so even though you're not an NCAA facility the state health code adopted that as the standard because it's an established standard um that gets updated based on um measurable criteria they do statistics statistical analysis and pools and so they have established a standard that Connecticut has adopted so what you see in the light red is um the profile of a code compliant an NCAA compliant diving Hopper and with overhead clearance so when the pool got made uh
061a foot deeper um es coach low said you've got one of the deepest pools around um but you still came up a little short in the back um you know it's questionable if there's any risk there not many people end up behind the board but nevertheless that's the requirement um and the bigger issue is overhead so the requirement is 16 and a half 165 in from the tip of the board um to the overhead clearance for 16 foot5 in beyond the tip of the board you've got this giant steel beam a little over 12 F feet high about six feet away um so can a diver hit it I don't know um probably not uh but that's not that's not the uh analysis I make the analysis I make is doesn't meet the code and
062the answer is no um you've also got some miscellaneous duct work and piping and sprinkler pipes and such up in the in the uh in the um oper but the reality is the entire roof deck is lower than 165 in above the board so um that's not a code compliant uh diving Arrangement um so right now the board is hoisted I I you know so people can't use it somebody will have to make a decision what to do with diving but um raising the roof is as you can imagine um a big job but um the only the only other alternative is to build another diving Hopper somewhere on the property off the property someplace um so then we get to the decks um you know when I when I evaluate based on the health
063code there's sort of two categories of Health compliance one is safety um so things like the entrapment at a drain or the overhead clearance on a diving board those directly impact safety um then there's this other category of um cleanliness and bacteria and that sort of thing so um some of these deck issues are more in that category so you can imagine somebody coming off the street um in the winter with salt and mud on their feet onto the pool decks um it happens all the time I'd say 50% or more of the pools we evaluate that that's the way it is because that's the way they were built back then um but it's a problem um and and should be addressed um and then there some bleachers on the on the end of the
064pool that as I understand it are sometimes used by the swimmers which is fine and sometimes used by Spectators which is not fine so um you know the health code is clear about an absolute separation between Spectators and swimmers and you don't have that um the other issue is this narrowing of the deck which under you know on day-to-day operations is probably is definitely not a problem there's plenty of room to to maneuver through there for swimmers uh during meets or practice the issue is if if somebody were on a stretcher being tended to by a medic that medic needs to walk alongside the stretcher to tend to the the person on it and that can't happen you can't have a stretcher and a person walk through there so um you know that that's why
065the health code requires a 5 foot it's not about um you know having enough space for meat it's it's safety for somebody on a stretcher um and then you know the the result of raising the pool deck and building this curb up a foot is this platform that sort of bcts the deck so um you know it's not a major problem from an operational standpoint it functions well um it it achieves the goal of getting deeper water and still having a you know a diving board up on that platform um but it does bisect the deck so getting the lift in to change the light bulbs and getting uh equipment in and out um where if there's an emergency in this end of the pool and and the um ambulance responds to to this side
066or this side and comes this way then they got a double back and just takes time and um so you know there's a lot of wh ifs and worst case scenarios but that's what the codes are built around um you know it's when we were all kids there were no car seats but they caught up you know it's just the way it is um so those are the primary deck issues um and then we've got the the kind of nuts and bolts the filter plant you've got 480 volt electrical equipment uh that doesn't have proper uh code clearance in front of the panel um and then you've got these filter tanks that are deteriorating and need to be replaced um so this is this is not an ideal situation there's also pressure relief on these
067that could spray water so it's just it's just not a great situation those filters need to be replaced sooner rather than later um ideally this uh if it all happens in this room and this electrical gear stays um that pad should be cut back so you've get clearance there's a national electrical code requirement for clearance in front of an electrical panel so somebody could work safely and not you know trip and fall into the panel while they're working on it um so that's uh that's another code issue that needs to be dealt with um and then there's um the PO the pool backwash uh filter backwash right now which is basically chlorinated gray water is going into your sanitary your storm system through a brook um the code requires that to go to sanitary sewer
068um so that's like the the water coming out of the filter is kind of like your um your dishwasher or or washing machine water um with chlorine in it so ideally that's not going into a brook that's going into a sanitary sewer system um so th those are really the big issues and there's a lot of you know kind of minor lwh hanging fruit like signage and some striping in the pool that's required um but these are these are kind of the big issues that need to be dealt with um with the diving Hopper you know the most daun thing there's a there's a number of ways to deal with the drains and the piping uh a lot of it hinges on what you decide to do with the diving um because if I I
069go back to the section for a moment you you you have a little extra room room at the bottom of the pool where you could in theory get some piping laid on top of that and pour a new floor so you don't have to chop up much of your pool bottom um that's one option another option that we explored is to um do select demolition you've got it's a 5 foot thick concrete pool floor because you have a hydrostatic pressure so there's two ways to deal with hydrostatic pressure is the ground T the groundwater lifting the pool up out of the ground um so you either do it with dead Mass so you build enough weight that it can't get lifted out of the ground or you do relief in the drains and let the
070groundw come into the pool your groundwater is contaminated so that's not a good option so this was built uh as a dead Mass pool so we don't want to punch through that um so we would do kind of surgical demolition in the pool bottom um only as much as necessary to get the sumps and the pipes in um and then concrete it all back in um but it's really the overhead clearance that needs to be dealt with and you know there's there's if you were going to try and do it within the footprint of the existing building um you know you can introduce a new columns and new beams to to span differently get it out of this this stretch um or try and raise this whole thing you know there's there's a variety of
071ways to look at it um so we tried to kind of bracket the report um in in worst case scenario in terms of building a new pool and I know there's there's a lot of complications on your site adding onto the building with the soils you have out there so um you know but a whole another conversation how you deal with it my charge was to identify the issues so I think I'll leave it at that and answer any questions Dr McAn Anthony and then miss c a question I'm sorry this is just a meeting for the board sorry you are more than welcome to submit a question to one of us try to help you want answer so so I I read the report um cover to cover and so I'm trying to make
072sure I understand um um the the age at what point different um codes came into play um so let me make sure I understand that because I heard I heard a couple of different things so it sounds like um everything was at code when it was built and then um in 2021 I heard the the um the the one code changed but I'm not sure about when when could you when when did um if I'm right about that could you tell me like when the NCAA um standards were adopted for for diving and um maybe the electrical code and maybe when some of these other changes happened yeah so um the the First State Building Code was adopted in 1972 so shortly after you built your facility the state adopted the First State Building Code
073um at the same time they adopted the state uh the public health swimming pool regulations um so when you built the pool in 68 uh there were no issues there was there was no code um so you built it to kind of what everybody was doing at the time um where you ran into trouble is in the 1997 renovation um once you change the volume of the swimming pool it's considered a major renovation and you have to meet you don't have to meet all the components of the building code but you do have to meet all the components of the health code for anything you you modify um so in 97 the public health code would have been applicable and in the public health code they adopted the NC the current NCAA regulations which at
074the time um I'm old enough to have been doing this in 97 so I happen to have all of these in my files but um um in 1997 the applicable NCAA regulations would have been the ones that were adopted in 1991 uh which has the 16 foot5 requirement so that's what should have been met in 97 um the 2008 and the 2021 standards were the Virginia grah Baker federal law not not State Building Code not state health code that was the Virginia Grand Baker federal law um applicable only to the drains it has nothing to do with diving Hoppers or pool depth or decks or anything else it's strictly about the drains so so when we finished the so when we modeled the pool in 97 it met the 97 code or it didn't because
075that had changed in 91 yeah my assessment is it did not meet the current codes that in 97 you put the pool out of compliance Laura so uh I'm going to cut to the chase um I think what gave us the most heartburn is the 12 to 24 months because God Almighty I mean that is there any way to work any quicker I mean obviously this is a facility that gets a tremendous amount of use and it just seems unimaginable to me that anything we're building a school in 24 months that you can't build a pool sooner than that I mean it's crazy is there any way to move quicker uh well I I think building the pool is only part of the equation you you know you need to you need to design it
076um bid it build it and you know from a from a municipal standpoint you've got rules you need to follow you know if this was Yale University they could write a check tomorrow and start construction but you know you've got a process you need to follow I think um depending on what you decide to do uh it it could be quicker it could take longer you know if you're going to build a brand new facility for example somewhere um then the overall time from the the day you start design to the day you occupy the facility I think two years is not unreasonable if you're going to try and do a phase renov a of this facility and you're only going to try and do the work uh in the summer for three months at
077a time uh I would say you'd probably extend it out four or five years um so it's all you know there there's a whole lot of analysis that needs to be done but it needs to be done based on what your approach is going to be you know the the other reality is you're looking at a pool that's um you know 50 years old and you've got to decide if you're going to spend millions of dollars on this facility do you really want to spend it on a pool that's 50 years old um or does it make sense to build something new um you know that Concrete in the ground um has a life cycle um and you're probably well into it and so you probably don't want to spend a whole bunch of money
078on a full envelope um and equipment and cut it into 50-year old concrete that known to be seeping chlorinated water so you know one of the one of the first things we do if we initiate a design process is we go in there um and core the pool and take samples of the concrete uh we do chloride testing you know we do the analysis to see if it's worth building on that pool shell you know we could with some some physical testing we can determine um the quality of the concrete and how long concrete's going to last um we don't have the benefit of that right now you know shortly after we made our first visit the swim SE season started so we couldn't go in there and do any physical analysis um but that
079would be step one to give you you know the information you need to start the process but um you know I think you know Architects contractors um you know we could typically move pretty quickly um but you know there's got to be a design phase public input as coach L said we need to talk to the participants you know this this study was done kind of in a vacuum based on codes and standards it wasn't based on programming or need you know if you're going to spend a lot of money on a new facility there may be things that you'd like to have that this pool doesn't have you might have the opportunity to incorporate so we haven't looked at any of that yet we just did the code analysis um so you know that's
080kind of a long way of answering your question but uh two years I think is not an unreasonable time frame for a major Capital project start to finish not two years of construction so Sophie is it working now I think it is okay thank you very much I think actually those comments were really helpful because they highlighted um that we really need a path forward um and a key part of that I mean first of all I'd like to say it's really nice to see so many people come out tonight and what's really important is community engagement and Community feedback um and getting all the experts involved and certainly um we are so fortunate that we have had coaches who have been with us for decades and families that have been um multiple Generations swimming
081in this pool so I really feel like to me the next obvious step is to move to a feasibility analysis of trying to think about both you know what is the use ful life of this pool um can it be repaired um what repairs make sense and also how do we maintain the tremendous Legacy of the Greenwich High School swimming diving and water polo um for decades to come so that would be my suggestion I we certainly we can continue to talk about this report but realistically I think a community conversation involving the key players is probably the best way to move this forward um I was going to say I second that you know student and staff health and safety our coaches um are of our utmost importance we certainly wouldn't want an accident
082to occur we certainly don't want to you know create additional issues and I had a lot of questions when um reading through this about costs timing renovation alternate locations if we needed them for Tim timing and state grants any you know public private Partnerships a ton of other things I also know you know we'd have to discuss far if we were uh trying to increase sizing or or raise the roof and anything so I I second my request was also going to be the same as Sophie to to see if we had a funding to do you know or uh interest in being able to do a feasibility study I don't really I live with a swimmer and a triathlete who uh was coached under coach low um but that's neither here nor there and
083I I certainly wouldn't want to see this poll shut down I know it's a a benefit to the community to our students athletes and and others so you know even our youngest uh members of you know our schools come in and use it Kathleen yeah I completely agree it sounds like um we should have a plan for the future I mean the pool is 50 years old so perhaps we should have thought of this earlier um but nevertheless it is it sounds like our community is doing fine um for now and we should continue to move forward with our awesome teams um enjoying the rest of their you know the time there um I just had one quick question what since what happens to the diving team like where are they right now okay and
084then they're done so okay so it's that's a that part's okay okay fine all right I just wanted to make sure we weren't forgetting about that okay so that's yeah that's part of the questions on feasibility like what can we can't we do and we have to make sure you know there's other options if if you know I don't want to see that we'll close you know yes I know it's not always our choice we we learned that in the building we're sitting in right now so Karen can I ask add something uh yes uh well Kathleen were you oh sorry I just go ahead Cody I'm good sorry it's always awkward on yeah I just I don't know if anyone would disagree with this but is it fair for the US board members to
085sort of give a little guidance or make a like a statement along the lines of the the two things that stand out to me are anything that can be done that gets out of the way of the diving team being or that enables the diving team to be able to operate in the pool we should do whatever we can to keep that going and then anything that can be done from a planning standpoint to make sure that the pool is not closed from uh September to June like everything should be geared around planning around that I don't know that's my impression from this but I wasn't sure if that's like something that everyone agrees with or if there's other ideas if it was something that everybody agreed with it might be helpful helpful guidance for
086everybody uh listening and you know the professionals involved of just what direction we want to push this I'm going to turn the uh mic over to Dr Jones uh to discuss the possibilities of feasibility and Beyond yeah I mean I I think that feasibility study is the normal pathway that we do all of our projects and the other thing that makes that I think really good is we're getting the first step out of the way if you have a random committee you would have to come back and then still do feasibility and then still go to a building committee and so it would probably add a year year and a half to this whole process and for those that don't realize what happens in feasibility it is great because you usually have a team that's
087working they would meet with coaches they would meet with some of the swimmers find out what is working what's not working but then they look at all of those technical aspects and I think that's what um um Michael was just talking about is doing that testing of the concrete all of that would happen with experts who know what they're doing at the table with us um so we do believe we've kind of been working a little bit behind the scenes trying to figure out how we could make something like this work what would be the next steps and we do have some funding and then you feel free to chime in and speak to that where we could get this started really quickly and get going with feasibility um I can't speak for for everybody
088in the board I going speak for myself but I'm pretty sure that I can speak for most of the audience that they'd love to see us move forward uh as quickly as possible I'm sure the board members uh who who we've heard from would also probably agree um you know it's it's a a lot of incredible programming um and support that takes place in the in the natatorium and we don't want to lose the opportunity there or time I should say as well so I mean I guess if if I can speak on behalf of giving you the direction to move forward to to start the ability to do feasibility that would be fantastic um and then you can reach out let us know what we need to do yep Mike I think we should
089I think we should speak a little more strongly and honestly I think there's a sense of meeting here I mean speaking personally um uh I was surprised that so many people were here because I read this report and it never dawned on me that we would close the pool so I don't know why um everybody got so riled up I understand why but I want to get to the bottom of how that happened in all honest it says it in the report well many times it says it I know I read the I read the report but nobody but I also read in the report exactly but I also read in the report that um we were up the code when all this was constructed I read that it was one of the deepest pools
090in the state I read that the code changed for the federal law in 2021 they um it never occurred to me that we would act as a board in any kind of emergency to this end um so I think personally that we we should take a sense of the meeting on this because the um I think it sounds like we're all saying that a feasibility I'm happy to take a sense of the meeting but I before we well we can't take an actual vote because it's listed as a discussion guess we can make a motion to try to have to double check Robert's Rules if we can make a motion to move it to an action item um but I'm going to let Dr J taking an action right we're just forming a committee that's
091well that sense of meeting on forming a feasibility committee I'm gon Dr Jones had something she wanted to say first well I you know I just want to remind the board that generally these decisions um we didn't come here tonight saying that we're going to close the pool I mean I I want to be really clear but you also need to understand that since I've been here in the six years we've had Cardinal Stadium condemned cm Ms was condemned we've had North Mayas the ceiling fell that building was closed we had to move kids for the rest of the school year the we just got Western Fields Back open none of those were a board of ed decisions and so I just want to be very transparent that at any time uh you could have
092somebody at the state that changes their position and they have a different opinion of what we can and can't do we have risk management that's involved um there are a lot of people that weigh in on these decisions so we hear you loud and clear we want our kids to be able to swim and be in the pool um but I just want to be cautious that it's not always our decision and the first four that I dealt with were not our decision um this is a great teachable moment for the kids that only a government run organization could have an issue like this emerge and take two years to potentially fix by the way I looked up on chat GPT the oldest operating pools in existence and uh there's a pool in England Cleveland
093pools that was bu in 1815 and is still still running uh I appreciate that you're a history nerd like myself yeah good so so you know 50 years sounds old but it might actually be kind of young um I mean that I'm 50 uh plus I'll appreciate that I think it sounds really young let me add that member of the board to be and I will say I have a pool in my backyard that is my age and it shows it for sure as I hope I don't but uh Miss cson so uh just because Dr Jones remind us that reminded us about the town risk manager who uh are they aware of the pool situation we've been working with all of the um agencies Public Works um you know the risk management the State
094Health um so far you know we're okay but that's why I just want to be cautious that you know people can weigh in differently at any point in time could be somebody a new director comes in and they have a very different opinion what do you bet that person is best friends with the tree Warden Cody I I love the the free the free speech option over there um you cracked me up um so I was goingon to say I I know we have a lot of athletes here who probably would like to know what we might do you know with this item as a discussion but I would want to get home to do some homework so um I'm happy to do a sense of the meeting to just you know go forward with
095feasibility to see you know what our options are um happy to you know for all for all of those uh you know interested in in uh supporting that keep the pool open in the meantime yes obviously keep the pool open for as long as we can it's not always as Dr Jones said our our option yes that's the sense of the meeting both both parts good point okay um to say everybody that would be interested in supporting the sense of the meeting yeah you want to raise your hand oh and I see Cody so that that would be seven seven of us that are sitting here out of seven so um so uh we'll keep you guys uh all posted um on where things are so we move forward and I just I you know
096not suggesting that everybody should just run out of the room because we have a lot of other interesting topics coming up but for those of you who are s yeah okay I'll give you all a minute for anybody that needs to get home and do homework make dinner and the so forth but I appreciate the support coming out tonight chair hirs was that sense of the meeting supposed to be a vote or was it just a very no it's just a sense of the meeting just very not somr yes it was a unanimous sense of the meeting that we would like to but not a sense of the meeting resolution just a hey what are your thoughts because those are two very different things now you tell me an somr has to be voted hey
097what do you guys are thinking we're all seem to be in agreement doesn't have to be voted well that's why I was going to say I needed to I was going to check Robert's roles of the meeting was around the basically forming a feasibility committee yeah and that's what I'm saying do we need to make a sense of the meeting resolution I'm happy to that would formalize it as opposed to just noting I'm happy to uh make a sense of the meeting resolution that we would would like to move forward with a feasibility study and keep the pool open uh a feasibility committee and keep the pool open in the meanwhile if you guys can support that if you uh Chad chatty you guys want to support the sense of the meeting resolution who was
098the second I need a second for that I think M yeah Sophie raised her hand so all in Support Cody yeah okay so we're back to 7 out of seven hrah um other people that I know that are sitting here that would probably love to get home at a reasonable hour uh to their families are uh all of our educational staff so next up on our agenda is the K12 stem Math and Science report uh bring up Mr Deo and uh our you know academic support heads here come on good evening everyone uh Dr uh Dr Jones Madam chair members of the board uh this packed room uh we are pleased to present the uh K12 stem report um I have the pleasure of introducing the authors of that report Mike Reed Andrew burn on
099the math side Tara Fogle Sean Hoy on the science side um I'm sure um as well as Mike read the report on the pool he watched the video on the stem report so we are we are open for business and we we'd love to answer any questions that you may have at this point all four of them are here and ready to go I know who's got his hand up first I'm G to call on Dr mcant Anthony but before you do that I didn't know if the authors of our study have anything they'd like to say first no look at them they're like peace out now Dr McAn Anthony thank thank you for the um on I I'll say on behalf of the board thank you for the the report and like that I
100think was comprehensive I appreciate how you took where um the data from fall and then brought it Forward of all the updates on bench midyear assessment and some of the other programs and things so that was pretty uh that was nice to see and it also um really points to in my opinion the real strengths of the program I mean some of the gains you heard in the GAA comments some of the gains are really really impressive and speak to uh speak to I know the hard work work you're all doing so that's great um I had a couple of of of just clarifying questions if if I could the um I'm sorry I didn't get these to you ahead of time the um I usually give the wars but it's nothing bad um the
101um Mike um at um um when you were talking about the curriculum um on that curriculum slide um on the cycle on the cycle you said that um in 2728 there was going to be a cost uh probably regardless of whether we kept going with the same curriculum or we changed it I was wonder if you might be able to talk more about that sure so we have a six-year curriculum cycle of which we're in year four right now uh next year we start what we call our internal audit and then the following year if we see fit to form a committee because we want to go in a different direction then the program we currently have then we um form a committee of stakeholders um and regardless of whether we decide to stick with
102big ideas as our program or move to another one uh we will have to re-up our licensing so um you know there's digital components to that there's consumable workbooks that are part of that so um even if we wanted to stick with exactly what we have which it's going very well um regardless we would have to um you know update some things now um it the cost is sort of unpredictable at this point but I would say our textbooks that we have at the middle School level wouldn't need to be updated necessarily if we stayed with the exact same program but um the consumable work teexs at our younger grades we would have to pay for those so um either way we would enter into another six-year cycle typically um with a vendor of our
103choosing program looks like what does that look like yeah so reflex is a computer adaptive program we use for um uh fact fluency and so for years um you know one of the main gripes of our uh teachers in the older grades fifth grade and Beyond it's um kids don't have their their fact fluency down specifically with multiplication and division and so um we identified a need to you know sort of mitigate that problem earlier on and so um we're actually starting as early as first grade it really would start this time of year for first graders with addition and subtraction but ideally we would get our third graders multiplying and dividing right from the jump of the year because that's the most critical uh skill that they develop in third grade which would then
104you know we should see benefits and reap rewards later on when we get to more complex math in the upper grades if you wanted other people wanted to M yeah I was just gonna say I remember the Mad minutes Mr Deo I remember that uhuh from way back in the day does anybody else have a question um and Y Miss bat um Sophie staying on the topic of math and your advanced math success slides all Middle School AP students scored a five we have unbelievable students in middle school can you tell us more about that yeah um I I mean we have kids from sixth grade to eth grade going to the high school um at various levels um one of our eighth graders is in the honors Advanced calculus course um and he actually
105uh qualified through the AMC and the Amy into the junior math Olympiad um he actually came on a on our snow day um Bonnie oan came in because that was the only day we could give it and so she came in to make sure he could take it he wasn't feeling well and he still did well um so we have just these impressive individuals at all levels um from honors Algebra 2 up um I should say at every level in Middle School um but um that go to the high school and it's it's really uh just a cool thing that I think we offer you know these kids the opportunity to do that with our phenomenal teachers at the high school that love to do it um and um next year we're on track to
106have probably about 12 or 13 honors Algebra 2 kids again and then um four AP pre-calculus kids um you know it kind of varies from year to year it's a little unpredictable depending on what kids are doing outside of school sometimes they take courses online and then they come in and show that they have what it takes to jump another level and so um you know the wonderful thing about Dr Jones is she's super supportive of of you these kids and and you know we go to Great Lengths to make sure that they have a you know a good experience and can get to the high school and can get back and we engineer schedules around them so that you know they don't miss anything going back to their middle school so yeah we have
107um you know just a really strong pipeline that's feeding to middle and ultimately to high school where Andrew gets to see that every day um how well those kids are doing so it's it's pretty exciting and you know personally I'm just super proud of the teachers um for you know just you know going all in with this program a few years back and every year we just keep getting better and better and this year we're kind of on track for the same thing and I'm I'm excited to share those results um in the fall hoping that um things go to plan Miss coven I have a question just with the math achievement data um the four-year Trend the three to five and the other one it just it looks like for some you know I
108try to track like cohorts like year over year um as opposed to looking at the four years in a row you know thinking like how are these kids progressing and but regardless um everyone seems to go down in fifth grade can you speak to why that would be and similarly I feel like everyone seems to go down in eth grade so I don't know if there's what's behind that pattern if you could explain what yeah so you know it's it's sort of a a hard thing to nail down exactly we do think fact fluency is one of those components um but the math just gets more complex our our counterpart Kim Paladino who works on the English language art side um she sees tends to see the trends go up into eth grade as the
109kids develop their reading skills um you know the the texts get more complex but the skills stay the same whereas math it becomes very um uh discreet in the certain skills that they need to work on and um you know I I think um you know there's a strong reading component that we see on the SBA as well and so that becomes more complicated so that's what we're doing with the building thinking classrooms really is we're trying to build some grit um so that when you come across something that's kind of jamming you up or making you feel uncomfortable you have that grit to sort of say all right I have to attack this problem another way and so um I think there's um you know a strong reading component to to some of it
110I think there's a grittiness component to some of it there's definitely a fact fluency component to some of it um and then you know in the past few years we've had some staffing challenges at the middle school level just legit reasons maternity leaves and medical leaves and um you know I I don't want to say that you know a math teacher is more important than any other teacher in the district but what I do know to be true is it is very hard to put somebody into a spot halfway through the school year and find somebody that's excellent to meet our standards and so sometimes we do the best that we can to put somebody in that's going to do well and and um but it's not the same as you know our staff that
111we have um you know um you know fully hired so I think um you know that's sort of What's led to some things the past few years and even this year we have some people out again and so um you know those struggles are sort of hard to to um manage but um you know I think it's the complexity of the math which is why it tends to dip and um I'm trying to flatten that out so that when they get to the high school where you notice it rises again you know maybe they can rise even further because you know I really do view it as you know one spoke or three spokes in a 13 spoke wheel right it's my job to flatten that out so that they can get through algebra so
112that they can unlock the rest of the courses at the high school so um you know that's the best way I can put it it's I wish there was a silver bullet because if there was we would we would utilize it um but um you can see our pipelines getting stronger as you can see in fifth and fourth and fifth grade those scores are trending to be higher which should feed into the um middle school and our algebra uh one through 8th grade actually is going to um hopefully increase this year as well um which you know that's one of our goals 75% which we kind of float around 60% there and kind of working on getting kids into a one level Advanced when they get into middle school so um yeah uh we have
113to meet kids where they are and personalize the instruction based on the skills that they need and we're working hard the elementary level to do that um I am shockingly you know don't don't have don't have questions I know Mark's stunned um I really just wanted to say I was really impressed and more than anything else proud um when reading this you know majority of this report like I I have watched you all build the programs that we are seeing the results from now seeing the growth of our students seeing that now you know we talked about algebra for for eighth graders and you know we're seeing the growth there we're seeing the growth in science uh you know as we've been pressing for more rigor in science and the you know you know in
114in depth in the the high Middle School courses um we're seeing incredible success with our middle school students as you were talking about in you know rising in higher higher levels of math we're seeing incredible success with our science students in Middle School who are you know you know winning Awards we just got some emails from uh Mr Bonte on that um you know our high schoolers are also winning those types of awards it's really very encouraging um I think for for members of the board especially some of us who've been here for long enough that um and advocating for so many of these changes for so long to really see the fruits of those labor um you know be be viable on the tree and so I just don't have questions I mean I
115may have one or two that I can shoot off later but I just wanted to congratulate you all because your hard work and dedication and the hard work and the dedication of our Educators in our classrooms every day is what has supported this growth and supporting our students in their academic Journeys and I you know I just wanted to say how much we really really appreciate that focus and that effort uh from all of you um and of course had a little panic attack when I was reading this report because I saw all of the um other textbooks and things that might need to be revised and I have a feeling I'm going to end up on a couple more textbooks committees but I'm happy to do so especially seeing for instance Big Ideas Math
116and how well that supported our students so you know if that time is spent well and supports our students as well as it has and we're seeing that growth here I just want to say you know congratulations um and the same to all of our Educators who may be listening so Mike I just want to talk about science for a minute um Tara um yeah C agree um 100% but Tara the inner orbit program so the saw against um in science and social studies the challenges you know around the country is right these are the non-tested subjects you've got the state test in literacy you've got the state test in math um science is untested um I'm hearing the report about except for two grades I know they um um sorry they um but I'm
117reading the inner orbit I'm reading the inner orbit um as a way of um like nailing down some of that content in in some of those other areas I don't know if that's your your thinking things but really trying to make concrete you know 3 to eight exactly you know the science content that we're learning on each level is that is that fair to say yeah and right now we're implementing it in six seven and eight to really get a pulse check because we know what our fifth graders leave with because we have the fifth grade ngss the reporting on our ngss is not necessarily detailed to the performance expectation the standards drill down a little a little bit less specifically than the ELA and math reports so we need a mechanism to continue to
118monitor progress through 6th sth and eth to better understand where they're going to be and we need these predictive indicators in eth grade so Sean and I together at an nsta conference a few years ago met within our orbit we tried it out we talked to a few teachers and districts using it and we decided this is something that we want to invest time into so we had them tailor these year-long assessments to our curriculum and match our performance expectations what we love about it is it reports out on all three dimensions of Science teaching and learning that's going to be the cross cutting Concepts the science and engineering practices and the DC and we get assess on all of those in the final test in eth and 11th grade so we're finding it to
119be a successful predictive indicator it's our first year our teachers are using it well and our students don't seem to feel as though it's any extra stressor within their day because it's just uh three times a year in sixth and seventh and twice a year in eth since they have the test at the end of the year we don't double dip there how do they get the results oh it's immediate so it's going to be immediate feedback for teachers Sean and I obviously can evaluate that on a district level teachers have access to their student scores and then in our monthly program meetings we look at grade level assessment data and full School assessment data families uh parents have access in the parent portal once it's uploaded we haven't done that this year yet it
120doesn't automatically connect to the linkit portal to have that communicated but again it's year one we need to figure out what that looks like did you have another followup no okay anyone Kathleen sorry I know I feel like I have to ask something um I don't have anything smart to ask but um maybe it's actually to Mr Hoy or and Mr burn maybe we could turn to the high school for a second um I actually feel like it might dovetail with where we're going on our next conversation which is really just a framework but you know we are starting to think about kids moving into higher and higher levels right and perhaps that's going to be impacted with students making their own choices but I don't know what would you I guess I'm just going
121to try to think of a question each one of you can tell me what your maybe your biggest challenges are because there's so many I'm only hearing the positives there has to be a challenge um you know for you is it in as you get to the next highest level in math and computer science those classes are still running online right um but do you feel like perhaps as you have it seems like a bigger and bigger cohort do you have a trajectory of those classes coming live in the next like three four years is that are you thinking about things like that yeah I'll just speak from the uh math and computer science point of view um as you all know as many of you know uh I came to a couple years ago
122with the proposal for the honors linear algebra class and so we do have it on the books that I I would hope that we would have enough students someday soon uh to run that class live in in person at at granch high school unfortunately the numbers haven't just panned out just yet but certainly with the pipeline that Mr Reid is speaking about um that that should be coming and and I'm glad that we have it ready and built out um for the for that day um from a computer science point of view again uh our kids are doing amazing things as you saw in the report and we are getting more and more interest about computer science from our eth to nth graders um and as a result you know we are able to expand
123that program as well and we do also have on the books there some honors Advanced Computer Science courses which have had to run through an independent study model but are also ready and primed uh should we have enough students actually run the class anyone asking for anything around AI yet well Ju Just interestingly enough uh you know as you saw in the report AP is constantly changing things on us um they did release in the last couple weeks um a new AP curriculum in cyber uh technology cyber security and uh cyber networking so that may be something that um uh I may be bringing to the board in the years to come um as an opportunity for our students to even get a broader view of computer science um and its impact on our society
124and uh our world around us so I hope to bring that to you guys in the next couple years I would I would think say oh good another textbook committee to be on now can we ask Mr hoit how about okay I have a question for you physics C yes has expanded in a major way is that right I mean how are we seeing that rolling out yeah so uh this year it expanded a little bit more um traditionally we typically have one to two sections and then this year we had uh three sections uh so that was very exciting but um one of the great things is a lot of our our um you know upper level courses our honors courses AP courses we're seeing uh more and more students take them just for
125example our uh AP Chemistry uh class it went from about 60 kids to 110 u in one year and that again is you know kids are taking being challenged and they're they're becoming uh more prepared to take these higher level courses and it it's uh it's exciting and we offer them the opportunities to come in and take placement tests to be able to jump into those classes and uh and what we find is that students are being uh really successful in the classes so um you know we we continue to do that and I I meet with students regularly um you know we we offer quite uh quite an array of of of science courses and especially at the AP level um so our our goal is to make sure that we are are providing
126students with with all the sports necessary to to get them into higher level courses um and that we're able to support them in there so um if they want to go and take those AP courses and take more AP Physics C and things like that um we're able to to Really you know provide multiple opportunities for students Cody I I I heard linear algebra and I I I bet bet you have a question over there no I always have trouble figuring out what questions to ask on these um things because I don't know if any of my questions ever have any impact they usually don't um one just from a management qu standpoint I'm always interested when people set goals like what the actual practical impact of missing the goal is like if your actuals
127were at the goal level across the board this year as opposed to missing them is there any operational thing that would be different right now than what you're otherwise doing well I think when we hit our goals we have to realign and and set new goals you know I think it was a bit of a surprise that we were able to reach some of those all-time highs um but in a way I think it's also a positive and and a testament to the work that's being done internally um but you you ask a good question you know when you hit a goal and you exceed a goal um did you set the right goal to begin with I think as we learn more about the patterns and Trends within each of those areas um we
128get better at setting goals I I think you know when we talk about the Strategic plan and we set metrics in the beginning it was a little bit of a you know a wondering about where the numbers should be now that we've lived through it for a couple of years I think we're aligning better with where the progress should go in the next two or three years so I'm not I'm not sure Cody if that necessarily helps at all we're yeah just what I'm saying is like none of we did not hit any of the it it's or we didn't hit any of the like Mastery of mathematics goals right um and if we had is there anything different that's happening because you know like let me give you an example like in a business
129like let's say there was a budget or something and I asked CEO hey like we missed the budget but if we had hit it what would be different and they might say well if we had hit it I probably wouldn't have fired this person who was in charge of something that you know missed right like there's you could identify like ah you have a goal the goal is guiding towards operational things and and if you miss it like we we take some action and I'm wondering if there's any actions that that if there's anything we can point to that we say ah we're doing this thing differently or having missed it than we would if we were there and the answer might be you know what the goals are really more just a thing to
130Aspire to and it doesn't actually change the way that we operate but I'm wondering where on the spec like if it's is it that or is it no like there are there are things that would be different today if we were hitting these goal numbers besides just we' we'd set new goals or whatever and I think it's the former rather than the latter on that which is an interesting question for the board because what is the point of setting these if they don't have any operational impact it's just something to ponder I might just add though I think you guys have have mentioned feedback um that's that is an outgrowth of Junior innovators in zero Hour I mean those those are new programs for us are we in our third year of zero hour and
131third year of Junior innovators as well those are an outgrowth because we knew we needed to stretch more we were not hitting the targets that we needed especially for certain population of students so I think we do that work every single year and that's why we bring new Innovative things to the board um so that we can continue to get better at what we do that's a cool example thank you appreciate that those are the things that are interesting of like this is off here's something we're doing about it it's a good way to think about the management of this I was also going to say um and I'm sure Mike is probably jumping into to say the same thing um that that's why you know we were kind of floating without a revised strategic
132plan for a while we worked really hard uh you know Dr Jones worked really hard as well with you know all of our staff and academics and whatever to set those goals and really uh push for rigor and things like you know additional rigor and things like that and you know we talked about making sure that our board reports and things like that were tied to those strategic goals so we're getting the data and ensuring that those goals that we set were the right ones right and so I think Dr Jones is correct uh Mr Deigo is correct as well that once you hit them you realize you've made it you either they were too easy to hit or they were the right target you move forward and again I I think because we have
133that such a strong you know Focus through strategic plan because we're getting data now um because we have this incredible curriculum team that is is going through our entire curriculum and reviewing and renewing and seeing where the holes are and and how to support our students of every level we're seeing ourselves hit those goals more and more frequently we're seeing growth in a way we haven't seen in a while and um you know I can't speak for other members of the Strategic plan uh committee but I'm sure we'll be sitting down to have a discussion of where to go next with that too Mike Cody I mean you bring up a a good point I mean we so in science um we we're meeting all the goals the um and in math um we're meeting
134the goals in elementary um which makes sense as you with the SBA goals because that that's that's where you're going to start and as the progress moves forward through the grades you're going to see more and more growth um but I was going to bring up a similar point because I'm wondering in this I don't know if this is a question for you Mark or more for us because one thought I had while watching the video and for the record like I was number eight you're now up to number 20 so the numbers Skyrocket we're trending right direction um congratulations um but one one of the things that kept coming to my mind is almost like so so where did why do we have this so we have the stem report in the spring um
135I that's on our agenda and things like that we don't have you know where I'm going we don't have a literacy report um if you look at our numbers in October there were a lot more uh flat indicators there particularly in Middle School on the literacy side than there were on the stem side so I I don't know like I said I don't know if that's us I think that's that's that's part on our end and I don't know what we can do now and things like that as far as it makes sense but it kept wondering why why don't we have why do we do this in the spring and why are we doing a a similar literacy report they um I'm sure they're wondering why their colle get off the hook they um
136um but because especially when it comes to and to repeat this is the the the science benchmarks and things like that which were so interesting and I continue to wonder about if we have those same benchmarks in in in literacy all the way through and if we're we're making that growth and I think think the importance of having that kind of uh return to our literacy Focus particularly since those indicators are not showing the progress that we're seeing on the stem side I feel like that's that's a failing on us as a board that we don't have that report if I could comment one of the things I I would suggest the board consider um you know one of the things that we highlight are the standardized assessment results and and we know that that
137kids take those tests late spring and then we analyze them internally over the summer and then we present the achievement report in the fall um one of the things that we could do um is we could present a midyear report using our internal benchmarking data which is predictive of how we expect the students to perform on our standardized assessments so it might be helpful for the board to consider uh looking at different types of assessment data as a a midyear check-in and then you know in my opinion it would be great if we would be able to present in July the the results from that school year but it's just not the way things shake out we have to wait until the you know the assessments are released from embargo data form Etc um but
138if you if there's the sense of the board that you'd like to know you know academically how we're doing across the board we do have our internal metrics that we could walk the board through again different data set different purpose for why we collect that data um but it's still relevant enough for us to have a conversation around because it is indicative of how we expect performance to be on our standardized assessments well I was going to say the one one thing I know that I was was going to comment but I wasn't going to do here but you know that we used to get a lot you know some of the reports used to be a lot more in-depth with some of the data and I know that's one of the few things that
139I would love to be able to dig into a little bit more because we got you know sort of the high level look here and we give us an opportunity to really get you know in there and uh dig in and support and especially you know literacy supports you know so many of the programs with you know you need High literacy to do science and in math with all the um you know word problems and Beyond and the other thing the board might want to consider you know analyzing assessment data is just one component but the other thing that you might want us to talk about are curriculum updates so for example if we're launching a new curriculum it might be helpful for us to come back midye and let you know what professional learning
140has has taken place um get teacher feedback on that professional learning talk about um the progress we're making in relation to the pacing guides that we set to make sure that we're in alignment with our state standards so that kids will be ready for the standardized assessment ments but you know there there's more than just assessments that we could talk about um as an instructional team and advise the board of so something to consider I love a guy who adds more work to his plate well it's really it's really all all for them sure they're all smiling you are I can't speak for them um Dr Jones I know you had something you wanted to say yeah and it kind of feeds into what Mike was just asking about the one uh group that's not
141represented here tonight is pre and that is absolutely tied directly to our literacy success and we are just now in our third year of all of our prek new curriculum which came before the board and we are seeing wonderful results so I think that was a big hole for us with our youngest Learners um and it kind of goes to Cody's what Cody asked as well and that it was the data when we were looking at the data and okay they've been with us in prek but then when we looked at them in kindgarten why were we not seeing more growth and we knew we needed to actually make a change um but I think that really closely to literacy and we need to be sure that when we're presenting especially in literacy we're looking
142all the way back to our earliest youngest Learners so so you have two different types of Assessments we could look at you have um probably a progress monitoring I would call it of La of the implementation of new curriculum and then you could also have us talk to you about the robust professional learning calendar that we architect over the summer and then Implement throughout the course of the year to provide teachers with meaningful meaningful professional learning that ties all of this together so I mean there's certainly other things that we could be coming before you and speaking on behalf of so we usually have a lovely curriculum you know Retreat so I think that looks like this might be a good discussion topic yeah for that thank you for bringing that up as well Mike
143uh does anybody else have any questions anyone anyone comments questions no well then we let you guys head home and wanted to just again thank you so much for the incredible work and the fact that you know we're we're really seeing the payoff now and uh I'm going to put in a little plug again um for parents who are seeing the results in their own homes um to come and speak at the be budget uh you know public meeting next week to support our budget because without the budget that we've had so far we wouldn't been able to um to do all this amazing work and and see these results and we hope to grow even further well on behalf of the entire team thank you for your support and I'd like to thank all
144the teachers who are listening out there because without all of their tremendous efforts these numbers wouldn't be as great as they are so thank you to all our teachers who are listening in tonight and thank you which leads us into our next agenda item I feel like this was done so well okay circular um to the ghs curriculum discussion and I'm going to turn the mic over to miss so thank you so much so if you might all remember at the end of our last meeting last month um we were hearing from a lot of parents at the time about the new roll out of the um course enrollment and um then I continue to hear a lot from other members of the community not necessarily positive or negative just can you tell us a
145little bit more about it um and then that sort of prompted well why don't we kind of have a more philosophical conversation about you know what drove that how it's impacting guidance how that leads to other you know sort of broader philosophical questions at the high school and just to be clear this is meant to just be a framework of a conversation I'm not ex I mean when we actually pursue some of these things we're going to have to gather data we're going to have to involve you know teachers administrators parents or who we've been hearing from a lot of students and us um but I think that this was just and I've I've received input from many of you um so this was just the beginning of a list um and like I said
146it's a framework um so we could just go through it I think we'll probably have we'll probably it'll probably be something we'll probably bring to a retreat where we're going to have to have more data on many of these items and then um include whoever is relevant um but I mean I just sort of start with and I think Dr Jones you probably could address the course enrollment because like I said um I think it's happening right now um there seems to be I'm sure generally good things but I'd like to understand you know what do you see as the upside the downside and kind of how where this process came from really I think on the course enrollment you're what you're asking about is the automation aspect and how it it is different um
147I think it's been a long time coming for us um you know we do a we were doing a lot of things by hand that could be automated which and and I'm just going to look a cellow back there how can we make more efficient and and better time even for our counselors instead of having to handp put everything in but not only that once we this is our first year so we're like on on entry level baby steps but once you actually get really good at utilizing the software even the build that you can do within the schedule is just so much more effective than somebody trying to do it um themselves and and by hand it's just that's the capacity of um technology and it's only going to continue to get better an
148example would be um we were talking about somebody had asked me a question on the board about okay what would you do if you had to use another Pool you know how would you go in and schedule swimmers differently and and automate that where maybe they're at a an off-site pool if they had to be and so that all of their opens are either following in the morning or following in the afternoon or but when you automate it helps any of those kind of issues go so much be so much more effective um and that's and again we're you know we're late to the party most districts are already automated um and I think it's exciting for us I think it's gonna we're going to gain a lot of time back that can be used
149to do other things clarify what you mean by automate so inside the actual uh platform inside the system a lot of districts do it through Power School Aspen's unusual there's not a whole lot of people that use Aspen yes yeah well yes no it's not your learning management system it's it's actually Aspen so it's not like school or your Google Classroom it's separate from that and inside Aspen you go in and you have to put all your criteria inside the software so let's say you do have a prerequisite you don't want somebody to enroll in uh preal before they enroll uh you know uh let's say they need to be in Algebra 2 you don't want them to be able to go and just enroll in pre-cal so you have to go and build all
150of those kind of components into the system so that when you get ready they're seeing what is available to them is what they should be seeing and and on the platform that the high schools rolled out they can also see their teacher um course recommendations are in there for the students um but you have it takes a while I mean it'll take us probably two or three years to really get good at it because it takes a lot of time and there's been a consultant helping this year which has been great but um you've got to get all that criteria inside the system are you automated at your high school since 2002 yep that's that well I was too when I was I was a principal in about 2002 2004 when we first automated and
151it really changed my role too as a principal I got I gained so much more time and I think I think that's what we're going to see I think we'll be able to use that time just even more effectively to analyze data and and have just more time to do the things we want to do why has it taken us so long to have that um like 2002 was a long time ago it just yeah I mean that's a really great question and um I'm not asking that in like a accusatory way it's more like Curious of I think it's a great question and I also think you don't know what you don't know if you haven't seen it and I think that that's part of it we are very fortunate at grenwich high school
152to have a lot of people who have spent the bulk of their career at grenwich high school so you know what you know and if you haven't been somewhere where you've seen it automated and see how it kind of changes the entire process how it can make everything more effective um you're going to be slower you know to come to the table and make a change change is hard um and so there's just there's a whole variety of reasons staying I guess staying on the topic so I think what we're hearing from some members of the community at they're worried about is that you know are teacher recommendations still considered are things just going forward without you know what is that that would be a significant change so yeah that's moving to the B that
153you have on here I think yeah um and they can still see what their teacher course recommendations are they show up um in the system and Michelle helped walked me through what a student view would would look like and um they can see that but but also if they're making a family decision there are there are parents who would say I want my child to be challenged and I'm okay with them making a B minus or even maybe a c and really be challenged and I want them to go in this course because they know they already know mom's a nurse Grandma's a nurse this is what they really want to do so you're going to have to challenge yourself because if that's really what you want to do you're going to be taking challenging
154courses all the way through to reach your goals so I think what we've done is we're trying to give more voice and choice to the families and the students but the recommendation is absolutely in the system I mean that leads me to the the next subject here just as as an aside I I know you know we we look every year at the course enrollment at the high schools to make adjustments and and you know in sections and the other things of course riger and whatnot and I know this is our first time with the new uh self-enrollment I would say for student students enrollment as opposed to working with their directly with the guidance counselors and I so I'd love to sort of at some point just hear how the guidance counselors are sort
155of feeling like that if it's opened up more time for them to to work with students in in other ways um you know and I guess that that brings us to you know the role of our guidance counselors and you know their perspective on the modification of course enrollment impact that process has had and and that brings us also to college guidance um which you can see a little bit of if in the prior report where there was discussion on the PSAT being you know offered uh and more students taking that um you know testing is definitely going to be coming back I think for college applications um and the sooner we work with our students at High School the better uh on the college prep process um so I'm just curious to I mean
156it may not be for tonight but uh you know would love to have a discussion on that on the role of our guidance counselors and you know college guidance timing the apps that they're using the professional development they're having um you know I know Michelle's here but it makes it very difficult you know if you're when we're they're working with you know only grenwich high school students um so they may not know the trends around the country or or be able to switch gears immediately if students aren't getting into C places and obviously our goal through the through the four year you know well through the all 13 years of our schooling and granich high school you know from 3K to High School uh especially from all through the high school is to make sure
157our students are college ready and you know making those goals if that if that should be what they want to do many students don't want to go to college they they have other avenues but uh for those that do I want to make sure that we're taking those 13 years and and making sure we're not you know getting to the end goal there so it may not be a for discussion for tonight um but I'd love to this whole I mean we can also look at this whole guidance section and get that on the agenda plan in the fall as well just for after we've lived through this oh thanks um yeah no I just to talk about the guidance piece I what I hope is what what Tony what you were referencing of like
158that they would have more time because they have this automated system so it frees up collecting forms and whatever all these Antiquated systems that we have um I love the idea of the efficiency of it and and I really hope that it opens up time because one of the things that I like about American Education as opposed to like sort of the more European model where you get on a track in sixth grade and you're stuck on the track um is that we recognize that some kids May really come into their own say their junior or senior year of high school and suddenly be ready for an academic challenge that they were totally unprepared for as a freshman so you know one hope that I have an and I I know of examples of this
159because I've know I've had three kids go through the high school you know so it's like the I hope the guidance counselors are sometimes checking in and saying okay sud suddenly you have this tremendous industry interest in history right like now maybe suddenly you are a kid who could take an AP course whereas in ninth grade you didn't seem to be that student you know but but you've engaged maybe you were inspired by one of your teachers and and you're a much more ambitious student than you were before so I mean I think it's just part of a larger conversation about the role of guidance counselors but I love if they are freed of sort of this secretarial work and and could engage more with the students of thinking about how they can be challenged
160and supported I was going to say just one thing going back of course I'm getting like texts from people um is that I think one of the concerns sorry to go back on the uh course enrollment is that the one downside I think there's a that our group of parents are worried about is that you may be going to reduce the um the rigor in certain class classes if students are pushed in that perhaps aren't ready for it now the answer to that is if they're fine getting a c fine but that teacher parents are concerned I think that um the classes themselves might be slowed down and that that would then you know obviously impact APS and so you have to look at sort of that whole trajectory right I absolutely do not believe
161that's going to happen I I don't think our teachers are going to just slow down their curriculum I I think they're going to especially if you're an AP teacher they've really they those results are so important to them and they really care about how their kids do there is no way that they're going to say let's just get off the pace so that we can slow the class down they're more likely to have a conversation with parent or student or counselor to say look you really we we applaud you for being in this class but maybe this is too much right now because Grandma's in the hospital and this is happening and this is happening and they'll end up going down a level and that happens anyway for all kids but I I just I
162I think giving kids an opportunity and the students an opportunity to excel at the highest level that they can is just so very important and it's what we've heard this board say I mean it's in our it's in our special education action plan it's you know this is what we've been saying we want kids in Algebra 1 well guess what it doesn't stop when they go to high school I couldn't agree more I'm just responding to queries that I get um it the and I think the and I'd actually question the other way like do we ever feel like you know we're Gatekeepers at times for students excelling and that's the maybe that's the other way if or you know maybe to sophy's point earlier that a child all of a sudden it connects and
163they should go to the next level but perhaps their grade didn't suggest that they should I I think that yes and I think it's not uncommon for any High School to to be challenged with that when you talk about gatekeeping and that's what Sophie was talking about you get on a track and it's really difficult to get out of that I and sometimes quite frankly it starts in middle school because if you don't have you know advanced math and middle school then you're it's you know it's one year after the next the great thing again that you know to the math team's credit um we are doing like I know bridge I saw the bridge to uh preap calculus will happen this summer we have all these Advanced courses that kids can take over the
164summer to be able to get on a different pathway and we need to continue to get better at that in all subject areas well I was going to say I know Kathleen introduced this as this was a framework for a discussion and certainly not all up for discussion this evening I think that these are just things we wanted to sort of put forward one of our roles as the board is to sort of ask some of these questions and bring up some of these topics often which don't fit into any of the other reports we get or discussions that we have and I know for me some of these uh topics and things uh came out of discussions that we've had at the XCOM um with our high schoolers um and talking about ways to
165help reduce some of the stress for that they feel um you know they've been given an opportunity to you know share some of their thoughts and some of these topics came from that from parents um from discussions with um Pac um and and you know all of those parents who are you know involved as well as you know some alumni who have reached out and so I think these are just things that were on our minds because of questions that have been asked certainly not something that we're looking to make changes on without any discussion or input from staff Administration you know and other stakeholders but these are just things that you know have been asked of us you know so does anybody else have anything they want to add to that Cody y something
166like um honors and AP class waiting because I know some of these have broader implic ations and then uh where you probably have more constituents you want to weigh in on and then some of them just seem like straight up judgment calls um that one seems like a more you know it seems like on one end of the spectrum where it should be it's kind of like you just have a system and you have the ground rules um I I I don't know is this the right form to like talk through like is one way to deal with a list like this to just pick a few of the hey we kind of we have a lot of the information or with sorry with some amount of information added we could probably make a decision
167relatively quickly whereas others of these are like longer term things that probably won't be resolved at least while I'm on the board like is there a triage component of this of what can be easily addressed with not a lot of information you know collected and provided and what is harder and should be put off is it worth kind of dividing it like that just an idea for everybody I think we need to have a discussion again with a lot of the stakeholders we haven't spoken to our Educators and our administrators to even see what what what problems they feel exist what problems we may have heard you know hear about from parents and and and students and whatever to to even make that address but it's I think this was Kathleen's purpose of kind of
168opening up this discussion uh to have you know which is what you were just saying Cody yeah but we can certainly move at you know the same zest that we move on capital projects for example so I think that it's I mean this is nice for the Board of Education to be talking about education um and so uh I think that we Cody I think you're right I think we should just keep moving along we'll probably have more topics that come out of this and then you know let's edit to our next meeting and then after that and perhaps there are decisions that we can make in the short term things and or frame you know um data that you'll need to look at over the long term to to see if the decisions were
169were in fact correct right and is the is is the point of this particular conversation like now is the the request to the public of because when we say like we want to get constituent feedback and all that stuff like are we gonna say the same thing next meeting or next meeting like all right let's we got we got the feedback and if you didn't get the feedback in then you know snooze you lose kind of thing I'm I'm not sure if I get process-wise where we are with that question I I mean I think move as quickly as possible but I think we need public feedback I think we need teachers I think we need administrators um but you know I imagine a lot of people have already these aren't new ideas right so
170I imagine there's a lot of data out there and um you know thoughts that we can get pretty quickly from I was going to say more than anything else and I I don't not not that I don't love public input because I do and I I do try to respond and read every email that comes in but um I think we need to be very clear of what our ask is um you know this as Kathleen mentioned this is really just a framework of of things and comments and questions that have been asked of us you know and I think we need to be clear of what our ask will be before we start asking for input from anyone um because we could get emails on a thousand and one topics so um maybe that
171is a further discussion that or the board can send um I don't know if Kathleen wants to or just you know to me and I'll or we do a Google dock of some of our questions and comments and we can sort of form that into a what is our ask can I just one more thing of course just the like I'm using honors and APS waiting um just because I get that one whereas some of these others are more like abstract topics uh if we were to change that is that something that's like a policy committee thing or is that a resolution the board passes or is that like a sense of the meeting that gives guidance to you know the head of the like to Ralph orever the head of the high school is
172and they make the change like what's the actual I'm just curious using that as an example and obviously there's because because every one of the broader point is every one of these has a certain feasible timeline at which you can get info to make a change and then it has a practical way that change is made like what would be the practical way to make that change first we have to just figure out if we need to make a change yeah yeah no no true just and I'm just saying we we very well made decide we we should we heard from um you know Lil earlier she she sent out a survey to to staff we would love to see um her you know share those results or other results with us on that but
173you know the staff felt that they didn't necessarily need it so you have one area of input we still haven't you know we haven't spoken to Administration haven't heard feedback from others and so I think we need to decide if there is an issue that we want to address and then how we would address it you know that's just my 10 cents but I actually don't even know why did the step matters for like how eight grades are weighted it doesn't affect what's in the classroom it's just what how the scoring system well I but anyway so I I can't speak to that Sophie um I'm gonna I'm gonna jump down to one of them that maybe we could talk about like a practical step forward which is the grading consistency of you know across
174courses like the same course but different teachers and I to me with that that's just a question of getting a report really you know from the high School of what is the policy and what do they do what do they do in science what do they do in math what are they do doing in English and in history because I don't actually know um and I just would be interested to know and and that may rise to a policy question at some point and certainly I would want to hear from the teachers and administrators on that question but I think that's something that we should have an understanding of and it kind of relates to the questions of honors and AP and all of that because it's just making um the educational choices that our
175students are making making them transparent right like what does it mean to be in regular honors AP what does it mean to have this teacher versus another teacher if you're in AP Physics um you know that kind of clarification so I think that that would be a report to us and I would be interested in it I don't know if other board members should be interested in it but you know that's something I would I feel like I would like to understand as a board member so I think maybe the best suggestion um of next are we you know we scared them away we freaking you guys out look Mark Mark's sneaking out um so I think the next step before you know I don't want this to get completely you know you know out
176of hand and overwhelm you know our Administration and and you know academic heads and so forth and some of these things and I think it would be best for us to either Kathleen and I am happy to help you or Sophie whatever whoever Mike whomever wants to step forward to work with Kathleen not to volunteer Kathleen or Jen um to take some of these topics and form them into what questions we might are what our asks are and the you know board can certainly weigh in oh look J J stff for J just volunteered for guidance I think it's the background isn't it um exact then perfect and so I you can share that amongst the board members uh for input on you know other questions or subjects and then we can sort of narrow
177down what our appropriate asks might be um you know what's in our review what information we you know can and should ask about yeah Kathleen yeah I I think that's a great idea and I'm happy to move on that um to Cody's Point quickly I mean just for a second I mean you can almost figure out for the course waiting um you have to look at comparables right I mean that's that's like the obvious thing you can't we can't learn from ourselves like we know what we've been doing for you know the past 50 years it's kind of like the pool okay we have to look at what other people are doing so um if we could think about that and then you know perhaps even get a college perspective I mean having I have
178one data set but you know my understanding is that they look at your courses they some some schools they unweight them they they do look at the rigor differently and so they wait some of those courses differently so it seems that a lot of universities have figured it out so perhaps we should and I'm not saying we should change it as a result because perhaps they've figured out how to do it right so that that's but what is you know what is Westport doing what is new Kanan doing what you know let's that data must take about 10 seconds to get right so so I mean we could talk about this all night and I actually this is something that actually I get fascinated and interest with because you know how can we better support
179our students or staff our teachers everything but um I think the best next step is going to hand it to you ladies to put into some asks and then see where we can go with that um but then I'll let Dr Jones say something then we can move on to monthly financials I do just want to answer Cody's question so you do have your policy 6146 which is where you're grade waiting so it is a board decision you'd have to it would go to the policy committee obviously to the full board but that's a that's a big one um and I do just to Sophie to your comment about um consistency I just I also remind us that teaching is really a human endeavor I have never ever seen every teacher grade exactly the same
180unless you're just going to a bunch of uh old timey you know multiple choice you might be able to get the same assessments yes sopie part of the fun part of the way to be a good student is to know which teachers to pick to get the easiest grades they don't get to pick their teachers just just saying they makees I was reflecting on College days more oh yeah well that's different um but so I you know I think that we you know again we could talk all night about this but we do have other things coming up and I know that there's probably a lot of people logged on to hear about uh the last two dat subjects on our plate which are our action items which we are we have two other items
181before we get to those so moving on uh I'd like to move to the monthly financial report take it away Ben Brandon and I'm gonna hand it off to Patrick Patrick it's all yours okay right thank you man um so the February budget status report up as we submit it onto the board um and then we have done a year end forecast on the operating budget and the school lunch fund at the beginning of March uh at this moment we expect the physical year end operating budget balance will be in line with prior year balance the key variables area that we are um paying attention is on the special education uh about the out of district tuations and also the transportations areas and then on the school lunch uh fund we expect it will finish
182the year within the budget with minimal balance uh at this moment we foresee uh we do not need in interim budget uh request on both operating and the school lunch fund budgets um any question does anybody have any questions other than me no anyone no okay I just have one quick one and and this is might might be something we don't have an answer to because we were talking about you know you noted in here that the state continues not to be able to has not is continuing to not fully fund the excess cost um and you know we know we're you know received less this year special ed um I know that additional funds were approved and I just didn't know if any information has come from the state as to what we might
183what additional funding we might receive um I know it would just be an estimate but I don't know if we we've gotten any data on that yet or when that goes funds might be released um we Ben you go ahead yeah nothing officials come through the the state yet we've heard a number I believe and Tony correct me if you have the better number it may be 600,000 or 400,000 there's just so many numbers thrown out lately that's correct we don't we don't have the official number from the state and we don't know when they're they they haven't you know we're working on this and we might be you know letting you know by X and releasing funds by y yeah we just know that they're working on it we I probably know more information
184from our um delegation in Hartford who stay in contact with us on all of this stuff okay I figured I'd just ask that question anybody else have any questions okay then moving on you two are still up for this one budget transfers budget transfer so the febrary budget trans transer with amount that in the in the report uh but I mean they are just within the normal cost of business U but into March I think we expect more budget transfer in the month of March because the School principles they are uh reviewing and arranging their per P allocation budget balance to the uh spending area that they needs for students so it is kind of like expecting more budget transfer items will be here in the reporting March anybody have questions Bud your transfers going
185once going twice okay thank you gentlemen appreciate it and now to the the other fun topics uh that everybody's waiting to hear uh us discuss and decide are moving on to action items first is the 20242 graduation date um and I will make a motion to set the graduation date for the 2024 2025 school year as Tuesday June 17th do I have a second Ms C okay uh we can now have a discussion on this does anybody have a anything that they'd like to nope anyone going once I me I think going twice I mean what was the decision it's pretty it's as early as it can be right yes this is exactly the 180th day so before I take a vote I would just like to mention one thing and I think uh Tony
186can probably say it better but I know that we've had these discussions in the past why can't you do it on the Monday um and I you know it is that that the entire field needs to be set up uh with chairs and and all of the and the stages and everything else they don't like to do that and leave it over a weekend and uh because the students the day before graduation do have practice run um so they need to have that opportunity to to do that and some other things to get our seniors ready to fly out of the nest so that's just for anybody wondering why we didn't look at Monday and I'll let Dr Jones address just add one more from the legislation is that right now because we're do it
187in March which is really helpful to families but it has to be the 180th day we would have to wait until the very end of April in order to say oh let's do it on the Monday which we we don't want to do that anyway um but when we do it in March we have to be the 180th day of school at least Mike so Tony we we we're doing it now because we're assuming snow days are past for the most but is that why we're doing this now no they actually change legislation so uh graduation date is hard it doesn't change so once you vote on it tonight and it's the 17th even if we had a week of snow days they're still going to graduate on the 17th okay but why do we
188do it in March then it's just always it has been in March um traditionally on the agenda plan and I think it's because people start asking because you have people that fly in from all over the place and they want to get their air tickets booked and they start booking restaurants and all the things that go along with graduation could we said it earlier you could set it earlier but then if you have snow you do run the risk because um if we set it earlier and we have five days of snow um we would have to come back and adjust it again plus the anticipation so fun yeah I mean who who would show up at our March meeting otherwise unless we were talking about a pool maybe I don't know um so with
189that exactly well at least you know unfortunately his elephant didn't join him this evening I was hoping to see one in a swim cap and some goggles but all right so next time with that um i' like to you know uh move to take a vote so all those in favor I'm setting at 17th okay that is unanimous as 70 Harrah so families of GRA uh soon to be high school graduates start calling your restaurants to make reservations now okay um so that leads us to the next uh action item the last day of school so I'd like to make a motion to set the last possible day of school for the 2024 school year as Tuesday June 17th which includes five snow days and Monday June 16th as the final day for grades six
190and nine inclusive of five snow days do I have a second okay Jen B okay so does anybody have Tony did you want to say something look like I I think I said it before but this is a date that could change so if we had a nor Easter knocked all the power out we were out of school for five days we would have to add five days to the calendar we have five built in when we make the calendar right so this is the this is the 130th day we've had one snow day thus far this year so we had to you know instead of the four built in five built in you now are getting rid of the four any other questions comments anyone going once going twice okay ready to vote all
191in favor of setting the last possible day of school uh as Tuesday June 17th uh including those five snow days and June 16th for grades six and n as they start a day earlier again unanimous 70 Fantastico so now we're moving on to agenda plan discussions um I'll hand this Reigns over to to Dr Jones and uh any other input um I haven't I'll be honest I have to look at a little more in depth but I do know that we need to add a some sort of professional development um for the board and I was going to take some reach out to the board members to take some suggestions on what they might be interested in doing some professional development on it's part of our board goals um I know we talked about some
192other topics that we might want to dig a little deeper into and I guess we can uh look into to when to add those if it's we should do that this year or give some more time um an update on prek curriculum is that what you were asking about prek discussion on prek and and okay I know I I've mentioned before Dr Jones and I got to um Talk early in this week and I know she's uh um preparing hopefully that in April we can have my a long awaited field usion conversation I think yeah that's why I looked over at you when I was asking because I knew that's that you wanted to add that and then sorry while I have you we we're scheduled in May for the app academic update on on
193school Improvement plans uh based on what we said earlier I wonder if at that same meeting we could also maybe have a similar update on literacy like we had on on stem tonight the um I know uh Mark left but um um it seems Seems appropo to to get an update on that yeah I think the best thing to do though is to before we pick a date to ask about let's see what uh Mr Deo thinks would you know give him the appropriate time to get what you know information he needs together anyone Vier Vier no one else no other okay perfect well as the board knows they can always reach out at any time to ask about adding stuff so with that Dr Jones you have anything else you want to add before
194we ask for the favorite motion of the night not at this time okay who wants to make the the favorite motion of the night Sophie make a motion to adjourn do I have a second Laura all in favor awesome another oh wait nope somebody's busy texting okay 70 another uh unanimous vote love it thank you all and good night