001[Music] i'd like to call to order the regular monthly meeting of the avon board of education at 7 pm on may 17th to begin our meetings we've gotten in the habit of doing a roll call this way it's helpful hopefully for people who are joining us for the first time just so we can acquaint you with everybody that's on the stage here i will start with myself i am deb shoot the chair jay spivak our vice chair i'm president thanks deb thank you jeffrey fleishman our secretary i'm president thank you jackie blaia president thank you laura young present thank you lisa seminara president thank you lynn katz present thank you dad sage singh president thank you deb and liz summerhorn present thank you now moving on to our administrators dr bridget carmola our superintendent president
002thank you dr donna nesslarusack assistant superintendent president thank you mr roberto medic director of human resources president thank you susan russo our business manager president thank you and shirley moy our executive assistant to the superintendent and our board clerk all right thank you shirley if you would all join me in standing for the pledge of allegiance the united states of america and to the republic of which it stands all right thank you everyone in lieu of reading the mission statement tonight i've been authorized by unanimous consent of this board to speak to our work together the avon board of education and the avon public schools together known as the district value diversity of backgrounds beliefs and perspectives and are committed to promoting an equitable and inclusive environment all students and staff regardless of race religion
003color national origin ancestry age sex sexual orientation disability gender identity or expression or any other characteristic have the right to access opportunities and supports available through the district's educational programs the district recognizes that societal bias discrimination intolerance and other forms of discriminatory practices can create barriers to students progress in public education the district is therefore committed to continue working toward identifying and addressing any barriers or practices that can lead to disparities among various groups in the school community and enhancing cultural competence through the district's educational programs for both students and staff we remain committed to promoting an equitable and inclusive educational environment that provides all members of the school community with opportunities support and resources that facilitate learning and growth to that end we use our mission and statement of beliefs detailed in the blueprint
004for excellence to guide and inform our decisions areas of focus and actions this is always my favorite part of the meeting it leads us right into our avon achievers and so i'm excited to be able to start that part with mr ranquitz our principal from the high school and i see miss devivo joining him assistant principal is mr kimball with you as well uh mr kimball is at a track meet in oxford connecticut right now and as we can tell outside they don't end very quickly that is true thank you but he does he does send his best to all the uh recognition students receiving recognition this evening i have the honor of introducing this year's class of 2022 valedictorian and salutatorian i would ask bob wang to please come forward at this time bob
005is our valedictorian he has taken at least 10 ap classes three uc three ece yukon classes following the two that are authorized for the senior english track he's participated in national honor society he's been a member of the boys tennis team he's on the math team the coding club and he's been a great role model for all students here he goes about the school day in a very humble respectful manner that many other students can can emulate so bob i just want to congratulate you and thank you very much his plans for next year are undecided this time but he has many options available to him so i present wayne valedictorian [Applause] next i'll ask shelby little to come up please shelby is the salutatorian for the class of 2022. she too has taken many
006ap courses and the ece yukon classes as well she's a member of the high school national honor society as well as a member of the leo club student government and the surname club shelby has excelled at women's ice hockey and as a result she's being honored later this evening i'll let i'll hold that presentation for now but also she will be attending the university of massachusetts to play women's ice hockey for the minute women congratulations shelby i'll ask dr devivo to come present the next two awards so i'm going to ask daniel wang to join me up here daniel wang has been selected as the winner of the national merit semen scholarship pursuant to an agreement with the national merit scholarship corporation the merit scholarship award is sponsored by siemens foundation about 220 companies and
007businesses finance national merit scholarships for finalists who meet their specified criteria daniel has excelled in all his classes at avon high school taking the most challenging levels throughout daniel has also been active in the leo club robotics club chess club indian student union club science club model un and of course the math team congratulations well done and our next student max newsome hello max newsome has been selected as a winner of the national merit 2500 scholarship the scholarship is underwritten by the national merit scholarship corporation with its own funds max has excelled in all his classes at avon high school taking the most challenging levels throughout max was the lead attorney for the mock trial team he has also been active in the cinnamon club the the spring museum thank you thank you the spring
008musical as an athlete max has been on the fall and spring crew teams congratulations well done so bob shelby daniel and max we are so incredibly proud of you that those are no small feats and the long list for each of you is quite impressive we know that there's quite the rigor in all the courses that you've selected and then you add in all the social aspects and the clubs that you've participated in we couldn't be prouder we know we're going to hear more about you as time goes on we are so excited for you as you move forward and you're just really a testament to what all of our students hope to achieve and thank you for modeling that for the rest of them so congratulations again [Applause] all right for our next portion
009we have um some citations that were given to us on behalf of the office of representative eleni kavros degraw so i will join dr carnimola to present them yes that's all right you're standing he was he was good so we have the pleasure tonight as uh chair shoot mentioned of presenting citations from the connecticut general assembly for um several of our students tonight for their achievements in sports uh first and we're doing this on behalf of eleni degraw kavaros degraw who could not be here tonight to present them herself uh first i'd like to call up isaiah adams who is receiving an all-american honors for athletic achievement in wrestling [Applause] good luck my daughter's somewhere to track me also hoping for the best uh next we have carver morgan who is receiving an all new
010honors for athletic achievement in track and field well that's all right thank you mr winner thank you thank you all right good luck to carver sorry when we schedule these we never know what's going to happen with athletics also so they're doing what's most important that they're getting the awards for paul netland for receiving all-state honors for athletic achievement and track and field no false here yeah paul's also outside of track we you're a good stand-in congratulations again sarah grady for allstate honors and athletic achievement in swimming [Applause] and again shelby little for all state honors for athletic achievement in hockey [Applause] thank you and thank you for stepping in to take the citations for us and we'll see them another time at school all right this is a great time of year to celebrate
011all of these things together with the students so we're very proud of all of you i just want to do another round of applause because i couldn't really clap so may is also our meeting where we like to recognize our senior board of ed student rep who will be graduating so sawyer we're glad that you joined us this evening we enjoyed max on the stage in your place for a moment that was a good stand-in but um we are absolutely thrilled to have had you working with us for the past two years i've got to say that you've kept us on our toes but you give honest feedback in a very kind and charismatic way so it's always well received and we appreciate the time that you take to do your research in order to
012come here prepared to give us input and we definitely listen and we take that to heart and we look at practices after you've given that to us so we are incredibly proud of you i know this is not the last that we have heard your name i am certain you just have so much charisma about you that whatever you do it's going to be engaging and i'm certain that you'll be successful so we are incredibly proud of you and i know i'm not the only one so i'd like to open it up to other board members who would like to recognize you as well go ahead jay so sawyer i always look forward to your reports no matter where we are and zoom whether you're involved in some activity you found a way to participate
013but you always give us a great perspective on what's happening with students and you do your research to know what's happening in other schools so we'll miss you but i know you'll be successful whenever you do next and once again appreciate your time and thank you for being part of the board anyone go ahead laura sawyer your professional manner and positive attitude to just brought so much to that role you are going to be successful no matter what you do and i wish you only the best and happiness and success in whatever you're doing but you will be sorely missed because you really you brought a level of excellence and caliber to that role max you're going to have tough shoes to fill young man but it's going to be awesome jeff thank you sorry
014thank you so much for your time you've been to us through some interesting periods you've always presented a great perspective and sort of our eyes on the ground and you've been a great voice for your fellow students as a government teacher i have to say you've been a great role model for your students as well here at your age you stepped up and you took this leadership position where you were sitting at the table where decisions are made for your fellow students and that's a tremendous uh obligation and responsibility you took on and you served as an excellent role model it was a pleasure working with you and i look forward to hearing all about your future jackie yes i just wanted to echo what everybody else said i really enjoyed having you and my
015most favorite meetings were where you were i think like in the middle of running a track or like literally just finished wrestling or something and you're outside and you're giving your kind of report and all your friends are a big gaggle behind you and it was just it was uh you really brought kind of excitement to the role and i always look forward to what you had to say and i really appreciate your your commitment we should all be so committed so thanks so much best wishes lisa all i can say is you brought a smile to my face every time you were with us and i'm sure that you brought that smile to everybody in this school system so best of luck to you sawyer all right go ahead paige sorry i've just known
016you for a few short months while being on the board but i want to say good luck in everything that you're going to be pursuing this year [Music] for college going into the fall and thank you for everything you did did a tremendous job lynn i'm with sage i haven't known you long but i think i have to admit that you're the favorite part of the meeting i mean you really i love listening to your part of the meeting and um you're so engaging and i'm going to encourage you i'm going to go out on a limb here encourage you to think about education being a teacher as a career because you would be amazing thank you that's a great idea go ahead liz i also haven't known you long but um i think that
017what you're doing at your young age is amazing to get up here in front of all these people and say your piece every month well prepared is really amazing and respected and i know that you're going to do great and whatever you choose to do in your life and i think it would be awesome if you became a teacher so good luck and dr carmola sawyer i can't say enough about how much you've brought to the board and your commitment to working with us here but also outside of these meetings many conversations that you've had with administrators with teachers with me individually and the perspective that you brought professionalism i remember the time you said to me you didn't think i was going to show up at the board meeting in these clothes did you
018i have a suit with me and i said of course not sawyer and i actually was worried for a second because we were together in the hallway as you know um we'll be sad to see you go i hope to hear from you moving forward and as i've said to some of the others we have a small gift from you on behalf of the board that we don't have tonight because it's taking everybody in america and otherwise way too long to supply anything at this point but i will catch up with you before the end of the school year i hope congratulations sawyer and if you don't mind i'm going to come shake your hand [Applause] we knew we had to get him in may because june you'll be off and running so thank you
019so much so this is the time in our meeting when we have all of these families joining us to celebrate their students and we recognize that you probably have lives beyond this if you would like to stay with us you're always more than welcome but we are not offended if you choose to leave at this time because the highlight of your night has just occurred so if you want to dismiss yourselves we are totally fine with that so thank you so much for taking the time to celebrate the kids and thank you for representing our track stars out there too and before i get to the next piece i'm just going to make a pitch if anyone is interested in participating in public comment ms moy has the list with her at the front if
020you want to put your name on that list okay now moving on to approval of the board of education regular monthly meeting minutes of april 26 2022 do i have a motion to approve moved thank you lisa do i have a second second death second bypage all in favor aye aye aye okay passes unanimously oh okay thank you for clarifying that makes sense okay so you have that jeff okay thank you all right next is communication from the public ms moy did you have anyone on the list okay prior to calling ahead i will read our descriptor for how it works this is the section of our meeting where avon residents have the floor to share their thoughts and our concerns with the board it is not an opportunity for conversation rather it's the board's
021chance to listen to feedback from the community please add your name to the list if you've done so some is moy can call you in order you must state your name and address for the record each speaker will have up to three minutes to speak in an effort to hear as many of you as we can we must adhere to this time limit you can certainly state that you agree or disagree with a previous comment if you prefer to be brief brevity will allow more attendees to be heard after 15 minutes are up the board may choose to extend public comment or not no speaker will include charges or complaints of a personal nature against any individual avon board of education member or individual employee of the avon board of education whether the speaker names
022the individual or not please refrain from clapping or cheering ms moy will be our time keeper tonight if you should reach two and a half minutes she will alert you with a 30 second warning bell at the 3 minute mark you'll be alerted again to signal that your time is up with two rings of the bell we welcome your engagement and participation ms moye if you want to call the first person forward the first person to speak is megan gaynard oh i'm very short but i feel sad my name is megan ginyard 16 brownstone drive just for a little background i am a teacher of 22 years and i've been studying reading for the past four years i do have two children at pine grove elementary school i spoke at the last board meeting board
023of education meeting and i asked for avon's esser funds and equity and scl work and funds to be directed toward our current k-2 reading and writing and spelling vocabulary curriculum as you're aware the state of connecticut has passed the right to read act that requires each district to align their curriculum with the best prac teaching practices also known as the science of reading which i'll refer to as soar from here on out by july 1st 2023 currently ivan has not fully aligned our curriculum with soar and we are in the process of adopting curriculum that does not seem to appear to align with sore and i have some concerns about that i have spoken with susan and jody and it's clear that we're moving in that direction but i do have some concerns first please
024use ed reports and or the reading leak tools to evaluate our current programs including fundations which is now rated as partially aligned with soar do not use level text such as sorry i'm lost my voice do not use leveled set text such as fontes and panel for kids learning to decode change readers and writers workshop which are currently being implemented for the first time because they are not aligned with soar and there have been some cursory changes made by lucy culkins and her team at teachers college but they certainly aren't enough and they have not been aligned with soar while we have words their way for spelling which is currently ranked three out of ten why not use fonte while it is a phonics program it's not structured literacy why not use logic of re
025english which is rated 10 out of 10 or phonics and spelling through phoneme graphing mapping for younger children utilize screeners for kindergarten because we know based on research that most kids who are behind at the end of first grade do not catch up even with intervention so let's screen them in kindergarten and do what we need to do thank you we need teacher training teachers want to do well they're great and i want i want to encourage them to get the knowledge that they need they can only do well when they are taught the best practices all of this information is available at curse research on google you can easily find it it's at your fingertips use it use me i'm happy to help please hire a teacher interventionist instead of a tutor for tier
0262 intervention these students are some of our most vulnerable population please do the right thing and throw a literal lifeline to our children because reading is freedom power knowledge and equity thank you thank you very much miss moy next we have two people who want to speak together ronan hearns north smith and sam arvela hoffer hi i'm uh ronan hernsor smith from eight stephens street hi i'm sam arrevolo hofer um from 17 westbury and we come uh as concerned um students lgbtq plus students um ronan i'm sorry i want to interrupt you can you get a little bit closer or push it down it's hard for us i don't know if it's hard for them my apologies um and we come as concerned lgbtq plus students from avon high um in the past month um
027there were posters put up for a trans day of awareness there were probably how do many would you say like 35 posters for that and there are about three remaining currently almost all have been torn down or vandalized or just completely ripped off and um when we complained about this it was well in addition to that there in addition to that there's also been various posters ripped down from the general club posters for the gsa in addition to um one sexual assault awareness whoo sexual assault awareness poster put up by um the circles club which is for gender equality yes that specific poster was for denim day which is anti-sexual assault and when we voiced our concerns we were told that ripping doesn't count as vandalism so there's nothing that could be done and as
028lgbtq plus students it just feels very unwelcoming there was also an incident recently i think last week where one student tore three posters off the wall crumpled them up and threw them at a trans student um which has which has been reported yeah so just to add to that um this kind of like behavior just contributes to um a negative impact on learning environment for various people in the lgbtqia community within the school of students um as discrimination from even a few has a larger effect on the community as a whole it makes students feel unwelcomed and uncomfortable possibly unsafe and in addition to this it just contributes to the worsening state of um like mental health to those in the lgbtqia community as a whole as living in a discriminatory environment takes effect over
029time um and just to add the school policy does have a very clear non-discriminatory non-discriminatory statement and just to add this isn't a political stance as all students have the right to having a safe learning environment and i just wanted to add that like even though um we were told that the ripping wasn't counted vandalism it still it still sends a loud message equal to the vandalism that has occurred because there has been homophobic vandalism and transphobic vandalism um it just it seems very hostile like walking through the hallways and seeing that all the posters that were once there are now gone because there's like i said literally about three left and one of them is duct taped to the door so yeah um i think that's all we got to say yeah thank you
030thank you thank you sam and ronan we'll make sure to follow up with you after ms moy that's it for tonight okay thank you very much for sharing your thoughts with us our next piece of the meeting is a student representative report by sawyer hernandez all right well first off that was a you know that was beautiful you know i'm not really an emotional guy but i was i was holding back tears i you know all this time i've been here for what two years and we have a lot of great memories together i mean obviously board seats have you know switched and changed but i've always appreciated what the board of education has stood for what it's continued to stand for throughout all of the you know trials and tribulations of the last two
031years the board has always maintained such an amazing level of integrity and fastidious care for the school and student body and i can really see that reflected not just in you know the dynamic with the public but also in the dynamic with me as a representative for the students i've always appreciated i've always felt welcomed it's always been a highlight of my month i regret not being able to come last month but i think that was the only month i wasn't here because i actually really do love doing this and i hope i hope i have opportunities like this in the future when i'm past dave on high school but i want to say i appreciate every every one of you and i you know you're all very near and dear in my heart even
032if even if i did show up a few minutes late i apologize i mean it was a little ironic but i was in the shower i forgot and i apologized in regards to the school it is may woopty will as a senior you know there's no better month junior year june gets stressful but may that's when all the fun stuff happens um it's really exciting we're moving in to a transitionary period obviously quarter four is about to wind down when it comes into june ams you have these eighth graders who are prepping for ninth grade you have all of the grades are obviously doing their preparation moving upwards you have actually a few cool events that just recently happened that i'd like to make note of we just had a big choral performance at a
033at a cathedral down and i want to say hartford but i'm not entirely sure i was actually in the performance we had a great presentation from not only just the high school but the middle schoolers and the elementary schoolers as well it was beautiful i heard a lot of great things saw a lot of teary eyes out in the audience so now that was really awesome sports are winding down i believe track is actually having their last meet as we as we meet here i wish i could have saw isaiah he's a good friend of mine but you know obviously he's probably out there winning medals or something in regards to the ongoings at ams there's been an uptick in covid cases coming in but obviously i mean that's been well managed by the school
034i was actually in the ams or ahs production of sister act which happened thank you for all those who showed up we had an uptick of cases there but that was well dealt with through the school there's been a great dissemination of covet test kits along with proper mass and proper information distributed by the school in regards to students needing the quarantine that's all that was done very fastidiously very very done very well and that's much appreciated by not just me but also much of the student body because comparatively you could say that where we were two years ago we were two years ago even a year ago was much worse in terms of just the infrastructure we had in place and in terms of uh how we were how we reacted to covet upticks
035i mean even as far as like thanksgiving of last year like that was a serious problem for the school but now i mean the infrastructure's in place where this the school functions pretty well regardless um i believe that's all i actually had on my agenda obviously because you know a lot of the fun stuff is happening now so not too much academic stuff but if i'm missing anything not me i'm not doing much academic stuff but oh my goodness you have a few weeks left few weeks we gotta walk you across that stage sawyer thank you very much on we appreciate it all right next is our financial report by susan russo good evening um always a hard act to file follow after sawyer a little bit more low-key here so our financial report the
036month ending april 30th 2022 it was a light month in terms of financials with the school being closed one week vacation holidays etc we have some variances in our certified salary lines due to our end of year stipending being cumbered in non-certifies our para educators and interventionists use small variances to clear on the allocation of a district-wide para educator budget our custodians maintainers and bus drivers as we head into the fourth quarter we see up ticks in overtime for those lines as we have some of the fun events sawyer mentioned we have a lot of activities at the schools after hours our teacher substitutes and our instruction we had some changes some leaves that we had planned we had a little deficit there to cover an unexpected early leave in other expenses we continue to
037see that unfortunately the rising costs and water so we're electric and natural gas it does not seem to be turning in the downward direction just yet so we're continuing to monitor that and we'll put forward budget transfers in june if we need to cover those variances in contracted services supplies and equipment we have some school requested budget transfers listed in the packet on the consent agenda to utilize some savings they had in some instructional supply accounts to purchase paper and some additional other supplies that they needed in special education we have six hundred one thousand three hundred sixty dollar a hundred dollars unencumbered uh those funds are going to be put forward to our escrow for the next year uh in addition to a little bit more than that as we wrap up those students
038that will be moving forward in the escrow account in the new year we currently have 48 students in outplaced programs as of april that number will be decreasing to 47 for may and we have a general fund unencumbered balance for the month ending april 30th a little over 2.8 million dollars or 4.59 percent of a remaining budget compared to the year prior of 3.9 million or 6.43 percent on the main differential there you call from last month i mentioned the way we treat our medical insurance and prepaying that to the town that two percent difference is due to that uh being fully expended in july thank you susan does anyone have questions all right so moving along committee and liaison reports curriculum and professional practices jackie thanks deb um i wanted to have a few
039to mention because i was unable to attend the last meeting i wanted to bring everybody up to date on the march 30th cmpp meeting we focused on pieces of our blueprint for excellence we were given a fantastic presentation that focused on school connectedness and explained what the most impactful ways to engage students are and how to maximize each student's experience in school now let's forward to the most recent meeting which was april 10th we were given the new primary instructional materials that are being proposed the committee approved them to move to the 30-day review period that you'll hear about a new business and i think that also triggers the ability for the public to review them that maybe donna will discuss there were major changes discussed for each area the powerpoint and the grade level
040units have been shared with everyone to review and the correct the committee moved the curriculums up to the board for approval additionally we were able to talk a little bit about school climate work and the student focus groups that ams are being conducted there is an annual school climate survey that's being reworked and will be conducted in a couple weeks and the superintendent shared information related to the social and emotional learning standards that are done by the district in addition board of ed members will need to attend implicit bias training as any individuals who are part of a hiring process we will be required to have that training and that's it thank you jackie and i don't think we have another meeting until the next school year possibly unless there's going to be an additional
041one okay thank you all right thank you jackie finance jay i'm sorry so i don't really have much to add susan did a great job in explaining everything we discussed at the finance meeting as she mentioned we have the transfers as part of our consent calendar but we also have on their donations and i just want to thank the community we appreciate you supporting the students and those donations uh will help definitely in the areas where they were donated and our next meeting is scheduled for tuesday june 14th at 6 pm thanks thank you negotiations we do not currently have any taking place but we are preparing for probably july to start for administrators policy laura so the policy committee did not meet in the month of may as a subcommittee you'll see under old
042business that we will be taking a second look at a second read at the exemption from instruction policy which was discussed at our last regular board meeting and shout out to the students who are here i'm very impressed that you were familiar with some of our policies so i hope we will get to hear more from you and you will continue to come to our thank you laura lia's on report for board representative to crack jackie um we have our i was unable to attend last month's meeting so tomorrow we are having their annual meeting i think in general there are ongoing concerns about funding legislative challenges with that they are a step we're working together to establish an open choice working group where we can share experiences and best practices among the all of
043the schools that participate in that program through the correct system that's it thank you thank you board chair update i'll keep it brief really incredibly proud of the work of our students again it's just so exciting to celebrate them and we're always looking for reasons to and they never disappoint so it's thrilling to even pull in the driveway and have meets taking place while we're here having our meetings and it feels so much more close to normal and if that's the reason why we couldn't have them with us in person then that's a good reason because they are living the dream hopefully i'm incredibly proud of our students and our staff are working really hard to keep that environment for our students so we appreciate everything that goes into keeping the schools up and running
044just lots of exciting things happening i know sawyer was in the play here at the high school and there was successful middle school play lots of sports and our students are really soaring in many of our sports this year so very impressive group so i just wanted to say that once again i will throw it to dr carmola for her superintendent's report thank you we'll start with mr medic in the hiring report good evening everyone thank you as you can see in the hiring report in your packet we have hired a reading consultant for avon high school that is to replace an individual who is out on medical leave for the remainder of the school year and also has announced their retirement in addition we hired ms siena as a tutor interventionist here at the
045high school to support our tiered intervention model we have a number of retirements many certified teachers so we'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate and thank mrs rafferty mr bise mrs bowden miss cohen and mrs o'boyle for their many dedicated years of service those individuals have taught in our district anywhere between 19 or 41 years so quite a wealth of experience that we are losing but we wish them well in the next chapter and also i'd like to congratulate miss karen wright a long time para educator within the district who will also be retiring we continue to have a few non-certified vacancies that we're looking to fill before the close of this school year in addition we've begun our hiring process for the next school year already with the referendum being passed we're able
046to begin offering contracts of employment for individuals and we have various openings in various stages we've finalized a hire for a world language teacher between avon high school and avon middle school for next year we have final round interviews scheduled this week for elementary teaching positions at pine grove and we're going through other processes right now in screening phases of applicants we have reopened the avon high school principal position to in the hopes that we'll have a greater opportunity to review additional candidates who may avail themselves of the opportunity um we did go through a first round interview and a second round interview with some individuals and we are looking to expand on our pool of applicants for that position as well we will have um more hiring uh information in the june meeting both
047for the close of this school year and in addition for some of the hires for starting next school year thank you mr medic and again we are working uh closely with the um aea the the teachers association here in avon and also uh with some of our other unions to uh and administrators and buildings to plan uh one big retirement ceremony for our staff to all be able to be a part of we've done that in some other years successfully and so we're looking forward to that again hoping that we can celebrate folks that are leaving properly in the enrollment report there's not much of a change from the previous month i'd say we're status quo i think we're up a net of four students kindergarten registrations continue however and as i said nearly every
048meeting until kindergarten registration is over which is basically when kindergarten starts is how it lands it's hard to project forward at this time we have uh 98 registered at pine grove and 88 registered at roaring brook so we certainly have a good number moving along perhaps a tiny bit higher than we may have seen in total at other years at the same time but again to be expected based on the housing market and the turnover um i'll speak actually first to something that related to what i just said as the board knows we sent out the information related to the building use and space and enrollment study that we are starting to engage in we were able to get that contract with cooperative educational services which is a state of education regional education center which
049meant we were able to get a study done exactly the way we need it for a price that was moderated by being taking part of it with a rest we had as you know put out put that out to bid several times two years ago prior to the shutdown and the and the rest of the havoc we had to manage during the pandemic but we have known that we should move this forward for the last at least few years because we've seen changes in housing there's been further development in town there's more development approved for additional homes and apartments businesses and so we want to ensure that moving forward we have the best information possible about how we utilize each one of the school buildings the space within them the facilities more specifically also as
050you know we have a number of capital projects that we invest in every year as a town and on the board side and we want to ensure that we are moving the the schools forward physically in a way that makes fiscal sense and is the best use of space for our classes and our activities and likewise it's always difficult to project enrollment but through a professional enrollment study we should at least be able to get accurate and appropriate timely information about what it will look like in the next five to ten years here in town so that we can make plans moving forward for the districting of our elementary schools at minimum because as you know we've had to make changes year many years in a row with redistricting between rowing brook and pine grove
051based on fluctuating numbers in the elementary schools so we're moving forward and we'll report back to you we're hopeful that that's going to get us some good information to move forward with also related to our strategic plan you're going to hear about the curriculum tonight for mathematics and science this is a huge project to both review existing curriculum and make any necessary changes in mathematics and science across the entire district but also to finish writing many new curricula for math and science that had not yet been written as you know we focused in on the core content areas in the many years that dr rusek has been leading the curriculum writing here out of the teaching and learning office and i'll let her speak more to that but we are very happy to be able
052to present that tonight and to be able to move that forward it was a huge part of our strategic plan and i want to thank dr rusack jody krazanski and our math and science teachers particularly our department coordinators mr sillarney and jacqueline waller for the assistance and in that process also of course everybody on the cpdc committee this was a very heavy lift and i'm glad we're able to show it to you tonight likewise related to our strategic plan we are continuing on with our school climate work our diversity equity inclusion work and as i won't repeat what ms blais said but to point out that our focus groups did happen at the school already they happened at the middle school on friday to gather some information from students and they took place yesterday here
053at the high school and there will be another focus group run a little bit differently here at the high school which we'll talk about in a future meeting that mr rankowitz has worked with staff here and other outside providers from some partnerships and funding and through grant money on our side at central office so we're looking forward there'll be one more round where we have students of color specifically able to speak about their experience in our schools in another smaller group and we may also move forward with one more date of the same focus groups that we had yesterday we're waiting on the data from those so that has happened we are working on the survey and we're hopeful that of course the information and the data gathered from both of those will help us
054to inform and support the work moving forward as uh miss blaine mentioned in the blueprint and i spoke quite a bit at that cpp meeting similarly today was the day that i was asked to present the work that avon has been doing in this area to the state collaborative group that was put together by the legislature some years ago there's a number of educators from throughout the state parents community members and legislators on that task force studying how to improve school climate student connectedness and implement restorative practices which you know we've talked quite a bit about and the and the law will require um in the coming year though we are ahead of that already here in avon which is one of the reasons that they asked are me specifically to come and speak on
055some of the work that we've done in the last couple of years it was nice to be there i was able to see there are some districts that are further ahead of us in that work that started that work before we did and there are some districts that have only done it in certain schools and haven't done it in the systemic way that we have and there are also some that are just fledgling starting some of this similar work that we've done related to social emotional learning standards and restorative practices so i felt good about where we are moving forward systemically as a district as a result of being there to talk about our work and also listening to the work of others also i want to thank [Music] tiffany fox and lori arnold you
056know tiffany wasn't able to be with us tonight who worked together with bloomfield high school in conjunction put on a unified prom for our students to be able to attend this is an opportunity for our students with special needs to attend a prom that has a combination of peers and special needs students and we were able to have a larger scale event by combining schools together in bloomfield this is an addition to our own prom so of course our special needs students can and do often attend our own prom here in avon however this is another opportunity for some that may not for whatever reason be able to attend our prom and also for some that may have needed a precursory view of what going to a problem might look like and so um we
057have some i think that will have attended both some that will only attend ours and some that only went to bloomfield but it was it was a good time and a nice experience for the kids this is the first time that we've been involved with it here so again that's related back to our strategic plan and our goals around inclusivity and school climate so i just wanted to thank them it went really well similarly just some congratulations that i i think i owe folks the play um as uh sawyer and mishoot mentioned was was fantastic and we haven't met since then so i just wanted to say thank you again congratulations of course the students we had here tonight we had a really nice showing for our teachers and our staff from our parents our
058community members and our and our students for teacher appreciation day and what we turn into a celebration of teacher and staff in general appreciation week might have been one of the best ever i think part of that is our community and parents just wanting to support the work that our teachers and staff and administrators have done over the past two years so i just wanted to extend thank you again for that um one last thing we had two students that mr rank wits and uh the administrators in high school and the counseling department ms mooning and i had the opportunity to be present while they were recognized today we are not recognizing them here tonight and i actually don't even want to say the names because i didn't check to make sure that we had
059that we had media permission to do that but i wanted to mention it because we wouldn't have been able to bring them to the board meeting um based on the quick turnaround and also the fact that we have we recognize all of our scholarship award winners and um athletics whether it's athletics academics or the like here at the high school and we'll be recognizing two students that i had the pleasure of talking with again today at the high school while they were presented with the proverbial big check two of our students who attend from hartford through the open choice program received scholarships from open choice um it's the first time i think in if not a long time possibly ever that we were trying to figure that out today had two students be given the
060scholarship it's not a given that any students that participate in open choice are given the scholarship at any school in any given year we have two young ladies here that applied for and received two of the larger scholarships um and it was just really nice to be able to see that partnership with open choice and crack going so well for our students one of the young ladies is headed to dartmouth and the other is headed to uconn correct i have that correct if i remember right mr rehnquist yeah so um i'll leave the the rest to uh dr rusek when we get to the curriculum and i'll speak a little bit to the policy when we get there one more piece i'll put out i'm sorry i forgot i was going to i had questions
061to answer from the last meeting as you know i try to do that when i can we had a question and or concern from at least two of the comments that were made in public at the last meeting regard related to one a book that um entitled gender queer which is a graphic novel for students that is geared toward young adults but has what many uh would find objectional just in this in the sense of um sexual um pictures that are in it um it does it is a book that is geared toward lgbtq plus information students adults and and reading and learning more about finding your place in the world in that way but you may have heard them say some of the speakers say last time there it is as a graphic novel
062it was mostly pictures and so there was a concern about actually they said that they objected to it being in our library i just wanted to be clear and respond to that comment our library here does not carry that book for the reason that i said because of the explicit material not because of the topic but it is in the avon free public library which i would expect it to be so i think maybe that was the confusion there there was also a question related to a handout that was spoken to about a gender unicorn to be perfectly honest i had no idea what we were talking about in that part of the last meeting and it took a little bit of time to figure out what that question was in regards to but finally
063after some digging and a lot of conversations with with folks it it clicked and we realized where that handout had originated that is a handout that was utilized as part of a professional development session for teachers that not not for students and it was one that we offered to staff in november so that i believe it was called lgbtq plus basics and it was a way for teachers and staff to become more familiar with using proper terminology related to gender identity gender expression and the unicorn was a graphic that was utilized in that training uh again for the teachers and the staff that attended that is not something that would be used explicitly in a classroom to to teach the same because the content was meant for adults and to the best of my adults
064and making sure they were able to have those kinds of conversations when needed and and understand the viewpoint of our lgbtq plus students and and colleagues and um again use what would be considered appropriate terminology and referring to different aspects of the lgbt plus q plus community so that's the answer to that question obviously um it was it was brought up by more than one person you know that i typically if i can answer questions and i haven't already before the meeting and those were two that i had not received before the meeting so i had not spoken to them i do i did not have the opportunity to reach to make phone calls to every single person that spoke at public comment last board meeting to be perfectly honest there were a lot of
065people and it has been extremely busy so unfortunately i don't think some of the people that asked those two questions in particular are here but that is the answer for any of you who are wondering on those two some of the others i spoke to related to social emotional learning standards at the curriculum professional practices meeting there were questions around those and what they looked like their questions related to our diversity equity and inclusion work we've already spoken about those and so again i won't belabor all of that but those were two specific things that i had been asked to answer and that was the information i could gather for you and with that i will thank you again and thank you to sawyer again and i'll turn it over to you ms shoot for
066the consent calendar all right before i um make a motion for consent calendar i just want to put out there that shirley moy has put a second clipboard outside of the auditorium where the agendas are located if you're interested in participating in the second public comment you can put your name on that list next i just want to reiterate what jay said about um the donations we are always incredibly grateful to anyone who takes the time to raise funds and to put it towards our students we thank you so much so do i have a motion to approve the consent calendar so moved thank you jay do i have a second second second by laura all in favor aye aye any opposed extensions passes unanimously thank everyone now we moved to old business this was
067a policy that did come up at our last meeting policy 6144.1 exemption from instruction and it's our second read and i know that dr carmola has an update on that excuse me we're on page 27 of the packet we went through this entirely in the last board meeting the red line version with the changes is page 29 i was asked by a board member about the family life education program exemption just to recap these are required by the legislature certain pieces of instruction including sexual abuse prevention family life education aids instruction and also that alternative assignments are provided if necessary for students who who whose family opts out of that instruction that is required by law it is also required by law that we allow students to opt out of that instruction and so we
068have uh regulations for doing so this policy had to be updated what i was asked about was the word on page 29 related to curriculum and and we have changed the word to programs i was asked about making that broader and speaking to board council about that because that is who reviewed and read this policy and it was agreed that that was actually a better way to word it and um actually shipment mentioned that they may make the change to their model policy to be the one that we suggested in avon so always nice when we're on the other we're on the other side of innovative policy there's one more piece i wanted to mention and that is on page 30. i talked about it last time the sexual abuse and assault awareness prevention programs
069um these obviously already exist here but this um this piece of the legislation the wording in the policy was missing when we were together at the last meeting and so i sent that out to make sure you saw it before tonight this is that top paragraph in red sexual abuse and assault awareness prevention i don't know if you have any other questions that i can answer go ahead jackie um so i didn't miss the discussion around this policy i'm just wondering if there is how are parents made aware of this is this in the handbook or is this does this come out in the beginning of the school year like a permission slip or is it that kind of a thing so there are certain grade levels and periods of time where these pieces of
070required instruction are addressed sometimes it's when some of them start as early as i believe fifth grade but when those pieces begin parents are notified that that is a part of the required curriculum at this point in time and this is what we will be doing they're pointed um to the curriculum and to this policy and to the opt-out forms should they choose to do that and it is done anytime these pieces of curriculum are and programming are employed throughout the k-12 continuum though as i said most of these begin i believe in fifth grade and just as a reminder these are the policies that by state statute the district is required and it is mandatory that we allow parents or guardians to opt out it is mandatory that we allow parents to opt out
071yes to be clear the dissection of animals is not required instruction by state law but allowing students to opt out is so there are some pieces of education that are required the aids instruction the family life education and the sexual abuse and assault awareness are all required uh programming and instruction by state law there are a couple of other pieces in here that you see that we must allow opt out of but we aren't required to provide however we do still provide dissection instruction in in some fashion jeff thank you can you just remind us of the context because i know last time we had a conversation regarding possible other exemptions we noted that the initial policy had a religious exemption which had been removed and it was explained because the context of these exemptions
072could you just give us that context again yes thank you so um the religious exemptions don't need to be a part of this policy they aren't required by law however we do allow them um and they are spoken to in other policies like our nondiscrimination policy for example so that part legal counsel recommended removing from this policy which as you know if we keep it in tandem with what the law requires and with the best practices according to our legal counsel when updates are made these policies are easier to update and we don't have to continue to redline entire policies that don't line up so it was recommended to take this piece out because otherwise we have it in more than one spot which always makes things difficult when we're updating thank you any other
073questions laura would you like to make a motion so hearing no other questions or concerns i would like to make a motion to move policy 6144.1 exemption from instruction to have all the changes new and that were discussed at the last meeting and tonight uh added to the revised policy do i have a second well second thank you lynn all in favor hi hi any opposed extensions passes unanimously thank you next under new business primary instructional material recommendations okay so at the last curriculum and professional practices meeting the committee voted to open the 30-day review period of the proposed primary instructional materials and they are housed at the central office so anyone can stop down during the business hours and review the texts that are there there are two english language arts books one for
074grade six one for grade seven a calculus textbook a personal finance textbook and two history textbooks one for grade seven and one for grade 11. so in your packet this evening are the curriculum professional development council recommendations and the individual primary instructional material proposals for your review and then once the 30-day review period closes these will be placed on the board agenda are there any questions about them at this point yeah jackie so parents can see these or the community can see these at central office correct okay thank you just come to the reception desk and we have them all right there for anyone that would like to see any or all of them other questions okay so we remain in that 30-day period and then we will revisit this at the end of that
075correct thank you all right our next item is grades k-12 mathematics curriculum okay so at the curriculum professional development council meeting our curriculum professional practices committee i'll get all these acronyms right one day the math and science uh departments had completed their first formal curriculum review and revision and their initial adoption was back in 2014-2015 so this is the first cycle of curriculum coming back to the board for a second time for approval with updates and revisions so prior to this evening you received a link to a document and that had further details to the units and it outlined each unit for you it also contained a comment box to help outline you know was it just a change in a title or in the sequence did we add uh standards did we delete some
076standards and if it got too convoluted we wrote a narrative of what the major changes were and the overview of the unit and some of them are new courses that are coming through for the first time and that was indicated in the comment box so tonight i'm just going to really provide a broad overview of the revisions for each content area and then can answer any questions you have but to start there are a couple of common things across each of the curriculums some of the course titles were changed and some of the units were sequenced differently which you probably saw in that grid and then based on the curriculum review some of the standards were added so if we found that they were missing from the grade level or the course we made sure
077that they were put in some standards were moved because they fit in one unit better than another unit that they had originally been aligned to and some standards were deleted if they were not being assessed in the unit because it's important to note that while the standards may be referenced or reviewed or even previewed in a unit unless they are assessed our practice is not to list them in the unit or we would just have pages and pages of standards and no one would know what the key ones are that we're focusing on for that unit any of the course changes because i'll be mentioning a couple our new courses tonight have gone through the curriculum professional development council recommendation process and have been approved by the board and any primary materials that you see
078listed in any of the units of study have all been approved by the board before they're listed in there so for math we utilize the connecticut common core standards in grades k-12 and in grades k-5 there were really minor changes made to the units of study some of the titles were changed and some of the units were sequenced differently so as we started this work um part of the reason we re-sequenced the units is because initially we took the recommendation of the state department of education on how to order the units but then after teaching them for a couple of years we realized and some of the teachers came forward and made recommendations that if we ordered them differently they probably would work better and we have seen better results in the reordering of them
079so that's why you'll see some of those sequences changing in grade six we realized that we needed to better align our methods vocabulary instruction in grades six through eight so a new textbook was secured and as a result of that the units needed to be redesigned but the standards and mathematical practices stayed the same part of this change also was the fact that the connecticut core standards are k5 and 612 and our curriculum previously had been written and textbooks for k-6 and 7-12 so we made the break and a line six was seven and eight it's the same textbook that seven and eight had so we have a much better pathway for our students moving forward with that said our sixth grade teachers also work with our 712 teachers on some of the professional development
080days to make sure that that curriculum and articulation is in place for both math science and english currently the largest numbers of changes in math really occurred in grades 7 through 11. so it started with our students really strong performance in eighth grade so the decision was made to move algebra one if you recall from ninth grade to eighth grade in order to open up the opportunity for our students when they got to high school to participate in more of the higher level courses and electives it opened up another year for them because of that result it's like this domino going back and forth through this whole math curriculum sequence seventh grade math became pre-algebra as eighth grade math became algebra one after implementing that change for a couple of years we realized that not
081all eighth graders were ready for algebra one that trying to learn linear and quadratic models in one year was really overwhelming and caused difficulty in the retention of the material which we started seeing in some of the high school courses so at that point what we did is we took our algebra 1 course and basically broke it into two parts so students in eighth grade take algebra 1a and then they take the second section of it algebra 1b as ninth graders and we've seen a lot more success as we follow those students through about two-thirds of our students take algebra one and about a third to take the algebra 1a 1b as they move forward another change was in geometry we had a number of students that really weren't performing where we wanted them to
082be performing in algebra ii so we had the geometry teachers really analyze the standards they looked at the student data from algebra 2 and their pre-calculus courses they looked at our standardized test results to determine that better sequence in geometry for our students so it came down to the fact that they needed more algebra to be incorporated into the geometry curriculum so you'll see that these studies units of study were adjusted and now they include the algebra standards and they're added in kind of that spiral review so they provide the computational skills and conceptual understanding practice over that year in order to position our students in a better place for algebra 2. so those are the changes you'll see in the geometry then finally in algebra 2 like i said this is a big domino
083effect moving on up algebra 2 had an abundance of standards to cover and many of those standards applied to students who planned on taking higher level math courses such as precalculus or calculus so based on this we have three different options for algebra 2 to meet the various student needs so the first option is algebra 2 which is only offered at the college prep level so this course provides students with the opportunity to strengthen their computational skills conceptual understandings of those advanced topics in algebra and it helps to prep them for the sat exam which is based on the standards within that course students in this course will most likely take a subsequent math course of statistics or trig and statistics the other two options are advanced algebra 2 or advanced algebra 2 honors and
084both of these courses go above and beyond the state standards and prepare students for the advanced math courses such as precalculus and calculus depending on which course they take they don't have to take that specific one i mean if somebody takes algebra 2 and wants to take statistics they can do that and vice versa but we have found that it's a little bit more seamless for students as they travel through that so that covers all of the changes to our currently approved curriculum because we only did the core courses last time but additionally for this approval cycle we've included the units of study for all of the electives the ap and the ece courses so you'll see things such as applied topics in math are ap calculus a b ap statistics the elementary discrete math
085in that packet that you received also i don't know if you want me to take questions on math or kind of hook science into because science is shorter and sum them together or i think just for clarity to follow the agenda we'll do them separately so that we can take motions on both do people have questions about math jeff just the clarification all the electives and so forth once we get board approval will be available on our public website for the public through to review they will be available um not tomorrow or the next day where they're on the website we just haven't been able with the company to link it completely but if anybody wanted to see a copy we can absolutely provide that and then just for my own clarification with the sequencing
086if you will so we're breaking down math into two sequencing right the geometry and the algebra and it all depends upon whether or not they take algebra one as a whole in eighth grade or if they take that split over eighth and ninth and that sets the two tracks correct well it the track then comes back together because after the algebra one it goes to the geometry and then algebra 2. but even in the presentation right so like the split algebra 1a 1b they won't have access to geometry until 10th grade correct it's one year behind the cycle so to speak all right but that does that prevent students in the algebra 1b track from getting some of those top-level electives is it just the ruled out because of just number of years of time
087left in high school or well they can still take the electives as they're taking some of the math courses in the later years also as they move on up okay thank you other questions go ahead lisa and this goes into effect this upcoming year correct i mean we've made these minor adjustments to the curriculum um and our electives we have been teaching them we have just formalized them in the same format the curriculum format that we've written the core courses in that are moving forward now okay thank you if i may just add in in regards to jeff's question and the website just wanted to make sure that we said again that we have migrated to a new site it's been it's an ongoing process we're rebuilding the site to be bigger and better than
088it was before but some pieces of that are slower than we would like curriculum is one of those areas because at the same time as building a website we are dealing with an updated platform that the curriculum is housed on so as as you know i think we discussed in the curriculum professional practices committee we wanted to ensure that the work was done and presented first and foremost and caught up online afterward and instead of waiting until we could get both done together um because obviously some of these we do need to move forward with in the changes and others uh we're just very excited to have done and to be able to have them available in the meantime if we have um anyone who uh from the public parents community members that wanted to
089see the curriculum we have them available we're just not they're not all getting updated as quickly online as we would normally do it and neither is the website in general we still need more time to finish working on that and putting things up both that were there before and that we are putting up moving forward i appreciate the clarification thank you and jeff just a further clarification when you clicked on those links and it showed the units of study that's exactly what's on the website we were able to run it off it's just not ready to present yet because they haven't been able to move it completely over and we also don't have the over 1500 units configured to move over quite yet we're working on that so so the document we saw that was
090shared in our google drive for board members to review that is ultimately what it would look like correct on the website where they'll have the units there with the hyperlink out for the specifics i gotcha thank you i appreciate that no problem so my question actually connects to jeff's question um and that has to do with choice and who gets who to the to the students themselves and their parents get to decide uh what track they're on in math c so or are they assigned the one a one b how does that work you said about a third of the students and yeah it's a recommendation so it's always a conversation between you know students counselors families so we have some students that you know will start in algebra and then move down we also
091have some other students that start in algebra one way one a and then a little bit into the year you know see the potential and we move them up so it's never locked students always have the chance to move up or down um but we like to support them obviously where they're meeting with success but also challenging them to continue moving up if they can but but certainly parents and students have they can weigh in in terms of definitely courses they take yep thank you good question lynn anyone else all right so for me on page 41 jackie i don't know if you want to make the motion um for math k12 or if you'd like me to make the motion and then perhaps you second it so the wording i think it will be
092nice and clear so i moved to approve the curriculum revisions for k-12 mathematics in addition to the electives advanced placement and early college experience courses that have been presented do i have a second i'll second okay jeff seconds all in favor hi aye any opposed extensions passes unanimously thank you and so now we will move to grades k-12 science curriculum okay so the science curriculum is based on the next generation science standards k-12 and k-8 again minimal changes were made to the units of study some of the titles were changed some of the units were sequentially or sequenced differently again some standards added some removed some deleted based on that curriculum review just like the math course for the core content courses at the high school which are environmental science biology physics and chemistry the
093changes were similar to k-8 in terms of the titles the sequencing and in a couple of cases we had units combined so the high school in some instances had like 17 or 18 units and found that students were disconnecting with that many so they clustered them together into fewer units but it's still the same content and standards additionally for the um approval cycle similar to math we've included the units of study for electives ap and ece courses for example the electives such as anatomy and physiology astronomy forensics marine science our ap physics 1 ap physics one and two in chemistry so in closing there were not as many changes obviously to science as math there were just the updates to the curriculum standards which were assigned to different units and some of the titles the
094bulk of their work was done in the electives and the ap ece courses thank you donna any questions from board members all right seeing none i will make a motion to approve the k-12 science curriculum revisions in addition to the electives and advanced placement and early college experience courses that have been presented do i have a second second thank you lisa all in favor aye aye any opposed extensions that passes unanimously as well thank you donna that's a lot of work that has definitely been culminating and we appreciate the fact that you broke it down for us and hopefully for the viewing audience as well and we look forward to when they'll have the opportunity to see it online but the good thing is if someone wants to see if they simply have to contact
095central office and they can do the same but thank you like to thank the board for their support in this and the materials and supplies that you give our teachers for our students ultimately and i also too would like to thank um jody krazanski our director of curriculum instruction assessment john celerini our department coordinator for science and jacqueline lawler our department coordinator for mathematics for their leadership but every teacher that taught these courses has their fingerprints on these revisions so thank you to every teacher in the district also for their work thank you and we appreciate the time they took to come to our subcommittee meeting as well to speak to these pieces it is impressive so and thank you to the board for approving these as we give our students even more options miss
096shoot may i through the chair go back absolutely i think i uh bit off kilter with finishing up my update having never as a superintendent sat in a public meeting and talked about the potential of sexually explicit material and whether or not it existed in a school so please forgive me um there was one more at least one more piece that i wanted to share which also was a follow-up to the last meeting we heard some information related to community dialogues in the town of avon and i had the opportunity so did several other board members to attend one of those information sessions i believe it was two weeks ago and so did other several other town employees and officials come to find out what that could look like for avon moving forward it was
097done very well very nicely facilitated by gloria manuel from craic which i think we've spoken about previously i just wanted to put that out there too because that was also something that was brought up and we heard some discussion of from the public last time and we were able to see that in action so i just wanted to bring that to light also thank you thank you all right now we move to our second section for communication from the public miss moy do we have anyone we do the first one is chloe noth okay chloe if you want to come forward same rules apply as the first section i don't think she's with us any longer is there anyone else on the list uh lenov i don't see her either there another that's it all
098right thank you very much and hopefully they can join us at the next meeting if they have comments they'd like to share now communication from avon board of education members anyone jackie um i wanted to just take a minute i was not at the last meeting but i watched it and i wanted to thank dr carnimola for your steady and stellar leadership through some of these very difficult discussions and passion discussions that the community is having and i think what i took away from that that i would want our families and students to know is that while there are really animated and robust discussions and debates about curriculum and how to best educate our students i would never want our children to think that that somehow is a reflection of their value or their value
099to the school or their impact on our community so that's that's what i wanted to say for the record that's important to me that that our our kids who are watching how we're behaving and and what's important to all of us which i understand is different is um you know that we take it seriously and understand the consequences of this kind of back and forth and how we can really strive to work together i'll also say i went to the community discussion event or training i'm not sure what it was called and it was really a meaningful experience for me i was grateful to learn about it and i hope that we can kind of spread the word because it was a really special experience and i learned a lot about some of my other
100pals up here on the board of ed also so it was great thank you thank you jackie anyone else all right well that leaves us with a motion to adjourn do i have a second okay okay i heard jackie and jay at the same time battle that out all in favor aye and i believe that's unanimous so we adjourn at 8 28 p.m thank you everyone for taking the time to stay with us this evening [Music] you