001on our agenda is the sixth grade award presentation great I have four Awards to deliver today and I'm very happy to do so so each year um our sixth graders receive various Awards and we um started celebrating that at board meetings so we're happy you could make it I'm going to tell you a little bit about each award and then we'll yes do you think you could stand like here I can stand anywhere you would like me to over here yes that'll be better for public great so I'll tell you the name of the award what it's for who chooses the award winner and um what the recipient will receive and then last but not least who the recipient is so the first award is the Jean es keer Memorial award this award was established
002in 1991 and is named for a former teacher at botel school this award recognizes the child who shows sensitivity and compassion toward his her fellow students exhibits a caring and sharing attitude along with respect for each person's differences this award is chosen annually by the staff the recipient will receive $25 provided by Jean keeler's daughter an O'Brien and family and this year the award goes to Roberts and bazano picture the next award is called the Adele win service award this award is named for a former teacher at botel school and is given to the student who in the opinion of the staff goes the extra mile it is voted On Again by the votel school staff the recipient receives $25 provided by the Adele win endowment fund and this year the award goes to Jen
003hry the next is the Susan a brusso memorial award this award is given in memory of Susan AB brusso a beloved Aunt of botel students who volunteered at botel for many years as a basketball and softball coach given annually to the student who shows good sportsmanship and exemplary character and leadership in athletics this award is chosen by our PE teacher Mr ju caneles this year the student will receive $50 provided by the Susan a bruo memorial fund and this year the award goes to Robertson Bazar and lastly is the Frank C Riley award this award is given in memory of Frank C Riley who is a member of the norfor Munch Langan nor family the recipient of this award has done outstanding work in creative writing and has chosen by the classroom teacher Mrs Ward
004and the literacy specialist Mrs pocker the Munch family annually sponsors $25 for this student and this year the award goes to kayen h thank you very much for coming it's nice to see you outside the hours of 8:15 to 3:30 congratulations well deserved you are welcome to stay for the meeting you're also welcome all right good night congratulations guys okay um next on our agenda is comment we have some members of the public um would anyone like to make comments that would be you hone my children go to school here not new to the community but a little new I've been here four years we're glad to have you welcome welcome to the meeting would you like to make a public statement we we ask that all statements be kept to uh five minutes or
005less and uh that I have a little statement I used to read and now I've forgotten me anymore uh but oh that's right it's word policy that we don't respond directly to public comments but we absolutely hear everything you say and that we uh will get back to you when appr I I have you know um I guess some questions and concerns but this is my first board meeting I think I just like to list of this to see like what's going on and you guys still you know all right thank you anyone else yeah Micha little story um that go here I would like to see the merger of northw and full School brought back to the board I think it's time um when everything was done years ago they talked about the numbers
006getting small and they small it's something that needs to happen that's all thank you thank you and willing to help with whatever needs to be done with Will to thank you what you guys like to say do you have anything you're presenting later are I just I'm so flustered there's so many people at the okay um moving on on our agenda thank you very much for your comments uh Spotlight on mental health and social emotional learning and that is where these two lovely ladies come in this is Miss Ashley Bono she's our school psychologist and this is um Miss Melissa Melissa dupus she's our school social worker and they have delightfully agreed to share a little bit with you about the pass assessment that we talked about at the last board meeting and some other
007things that they are working on so I will give a little bit of information about the past um I don't know how much you have already heard about it but um it's basically you know social emotional screener for the the entire School takes it um there's two different tests based on like grade level so K through two takes the test that's like age appropriate for them and then three through five takes another um test that's appropriate for them and then six is also separate so um there's different factors that it measures um and the K through two doesn't measure as many factors because of um it's just not age appropriate to do so um but some of the factors include um there's feelings about school perceived learning capability um self-regard or their self-concept preparedness for
008learning attitudes to teachers General work ethic confidence in learning attitudes to attendance and response to curriculum demands so it's just a set of questions that they answer I think there it takes some 15 minutes to 20 minutes um to answer all the questions um and it's basically on a scale of how much they agree with the statement um being said um and their answers kind of result in um different percentiles for each factor um so the percentiles are kind of based on like standardized Norms um so you know schools Across the Nation um and um um the 31st to 100 percentile um means a high satisfaction with their school experienced the 21st to the 30th percentile is moderate satisfaction um the sixth to 20th percentile is low moderate satisfaction and the lowest 5% is low
009satisfaction so um basically what we do with that information is if we see you know specific groups or um students that fall within you know lower percentiles we can kind of provide intervention um for example um Melissa and I are running a social skills group based on some of um the data that we receive from students you're doing a great job um Ash is really great with the numbers I'm more of the emotional person as a social worker but um yeah we've actually taken the data it's been um really nice to kind of lay out and it also for us kind of comes in this color coded way where we see a green yellow orange red um and we're able again just to kind of look at look at it and look at the big
010picture and it also helped us pick up some data on kids that kind of we think the kids that they're they're they're doing very well academically they're kind of always no issues never coming down to our office but when they answer the question there's a lot of internalized um emotions or Alles they're having with anxiety or anywhere in that social emotional area so it's really been also able for us to kind of take a look at some students who are kind of like okay um you know no Stigma towards it or we don't want to like you know flag them as it's a bad thing but just for us to kind of have extra set of eyes um provide some even informal check-ins or run extra Lunch Bunch groups where we kind of collectively get
011a bunch of students together um and do our you know they don't think it's um that was therapy they don't think it's therapy we kind of make it fun a lot of games just the natural socialization um and kind of building that self-esteem um we've also Incorporated a lot of our ruler lessons that's where our lessons are based off of um we've taken some of the themes from the information we've got from this data and we'll run um classified lessons on it um self-esteem sometimes aded towards towards school um just anything that we that maybe needs a little bit more Focus From the social emotional lens um we've taken a deeper dive and have been trying to provide um and trying to be as proactive as possible too um but just trying to take that
012approach with this information we received can you describe the timeline of the testing like so when was the test given is it given you check in again or how so we give it in the fall and also in the spring we did our first round of it and we're do our second round um late May or June to see you know and have their you know the with the interventions we've had been providing have there been any changes um you know with our um lessons have we seen changes as a result of that so it's it's helpful data for us to see um where the kids forgive me if I miss please is there a percentage of students that see you or you or both like you have like a percentage of students that have
013sort of mental health or social emotional needs like specifically that came from like um data or yeah just like in in general like on like I don't know if you've kept this data like throughout the school year yeah I mean both ways you know we have a percentage I don't have a percentage off top my head um of kids that you know require social emotional interuption um and uh from you know we have a specific number of students that kind of we're providing intervention and doing extra checkings with as a result of the data that we got scre well I guess the the basis of my question is that I know the trend National is up across all age groups right and it's always the question of like do people have more language so they're
014able to express their needs or is like the state of the world and the state of people really that much worse that people's mental health and needs are suffering so I was just wondering if that like sort of trend is repeated here or not yeah I mean um I guess we would have to kind of and and there's some kids you know with disabilities you know that on their IEP or 504 plan is part of that plan they have social skills or counseling or you know whatever the need is if they have you know some executive functioning challenges and so different layers of that can also be included in those individualized plans per their disability but I think that's an interesting we can certainly get that information for you which of the kids are we
015seeing kind of in an informal way which of the kids is it more formalized and what is the overall percentage Yeah and I'm not sure if your question was kind of getting at this but depending on the level of intervention if it's an IEP or if it's a formal sessions or support there would be parent notification and parent involvement um my understanding of the children who are seen informally through some these interventions that's not necessarily something that parents would be notified or have parent permission to be included in the group yes like it's usually in form and again we kind of Bas it off our tears as well but like our informal stuff it's just kind of sometimes in the moment right sometimes we see a situation how can we help a kid in the
016moment how can we help a child process how can we help um you know mediate into a certain situation too I think in the last couple years what we've seen on the on the social emotional side is a lot of the social basic social skills um you know I I don't really s like a broken record but from the pandemic there has been a lot of Trends where you know kids in this age group um during that time missed on really important years of being in person the social piece um you know the our children who were being taught with mask I mean it definitely has impacted several areas of the social emotional um realm and again our supports when we say formally informally it's just catching and being proactive and in the moment and
017what we can do um you know push into classroom sometimes you know we're there just to kind of sit back and see if there's any ex support we can provide um but yeah usually informally and sometimes even informal if we feel like we need to um increase it we always constantly try to have as much parent communication um you know and I collaborate constantly as a team if there's a student she sees that maybe um you know I can take on a little more we definitely communicate I always put her on emails with par vice versa sometimes just to make sure that parents are aware of it we are a team we work it's a small community we want to be in the loop with each other's students because it is important we are constantly
018you know crossing over those down so great thank you so anybody else have any other questions okay thanks thank you very much next on our agenda is you too are also free to leave don't you're welcome to stay [Laughter] but next on our agenda is the approval of the minutes everyone get a copy of that in their package I AG okay you have a motion made in seconded all those in favor Ginger yeah I'm in favor okay all right then motion cares I received no correspondence so we'll move on to the superintendence report okay so that's that's some updates for you I talked to Matt again last week about the boiler and um he indicated that now that the budget season is wrapping up he would be able to give that more of his attention
019I uh reiterated that it's really critical that a decision is made as to you know who he's going to work with to replace the boiler because it's going to take time for the parts to be ordered and to be put on a schedule and we want this work we need this work to be done over the summer we cannot temp the fates with another season with the boiler system we have and we don't want the work to be going on while kids are in school so I will continue to check in with him and see where we are um in terms of that timeline um I did also ask him about the slide and um while it should be under warrantee I'm not sure how long that warranty window lasts and it doesn't appear to
020be a high priority for the Selectmen um he indicated that he really it was not a priority there a lot of things going on and so um the strategy that I've discussed with an and with Richard is that we are going to try to get Janet burn to take that on and be the aggressor and and fight that fight because it's an institution in North Park it's something that has been beloved by our school by our community and we it would be a shame for the investment we've made to not take advantage of the you know um yeah and so if I understand correctly if you if you're given the name you'd be willing to follow up I would be willing to call but I don't have a contact you know I can certainly request
021that and write it You' got that okay so we will call and let you know I'm not sure if they've even been contacted to so that they know that this slide has fallen apart but Mary Beth I'm sorry yeah yeah um I spoke to Matt like two weeks ago when he was Paving my road and he has been in touch with them um since and I sent him pictures of when they were installing it to show that they didn't put proper Footers down they just sort of put some bags of cement without actually putting like um like digging down enough and even that the augur they were using was like not even three feet um so although they may say it's for you know children ages five through 12 um on one sticker like you
022know so I I gave him a bunch of information that he could follow up with them just great just so you know thank you you're welcome more people on this the better but we will call and make you know I don't think it would be hurt it would hurt for us to make a followup call to just check in and and see you know if we can be kept in the The Loop in terms of the timeline and you know what we can expect yeah well you're the people on the ground here so they should coordinate with you any support that you need that way all right huge investment we can't just let the town's investment go let's see so um because of a few different personel issues um with our night custodians we did
023have to terminate our night custodian so we are in the process of looking for a sixh hour a night shift night custodian um we've been advertising we have had some interest um we yet to have a candidate that was someone that we could offer the job to but we are in the process of that I'm hoping to get somebody on soon and certainly to acclimate them and get them on board before the summer we're looking at the budget and making sure that you know we're doing everything we need to do to be set to close things out for June um we as anticipated all year long we'll be over our special ed budget uh we continue to do what we can to mitigate that uh at this point um the town we being told at
024the town will receive about $46,000 in excess cost to mitigate that unexpected cost um and we have applied for grant money that would also help to um offset that unexpected expense everything else looks like it's good we you know certainly at the next meeting we'll let the board know where we need to shift things within areas to balance out some of the overages and and underages um in the budget that happens every year and we'll go over that in in June can you remind me why the substitutes and regular teachers is so far this budget we had just a year with teachers who was had some really tough years in terms of physical um issues um family issues the last contract allows our teachers to use up to five or 15 of their six days
025C you remember this year is next year they canuse family there have been family issues you may be able to speak a little bit to that we've also had um this year we've been implementing the new literacy curriculum and so with that comes um 10 days we plan for 10 days of professional learning to go along with that so those aren't full days where teachers are out of the classroom but we do have to hire a substitute that floats from classroom to classroom to cover those um sessions where the teachers meet with the representative coach from the literacy curriculum to you know deliver that professional learning in addition the state offered a science of reading professional learning opportunity um that we were able to slip into at the last minute and didn't anticipate you know
026we didn't plan for that in the budget so that is about six sessions one teacher has been released a full day and then again two teachers released for half out half half day sessions so those added up we you know more than we anticipated um but isn't a typical you know that's not a typical typically reflected in the budget thank you so we don't anticipated being so high next year no no it's a better for many many years we had a placeholder of $6,000 for substitutes we never use that much so a few years ago we reduced it to 3,000 and then of course is you know luck would have it this would be a year where we could use that ,000 in the budget but it's atypical and we don't expect that um in
027terms of even the professional development it's been front loaded and we we not expecting to have that degree of of need next year nope and we also have the benefit of building that into our PD calendar and taking advantage of more of the half days in the building professional development days when this program was adopted did it was you know we didn't anticipate that didn't have the opportunity to really get that into our PD calender but so next year there should be less teacher pull out in order to provide the professional development thank you oh you are welcome and then the other thing I just want to make you aware of um I had received an email from Mike SC um with a lot of question marks and explanation marks um because there had been
028an inquiry uh from a resident about the fact that we have um teachers here whose children come to school here even though they don't live in nor war and board created policy for this a while back and for a lot of reasons um one of which it enables us to hire teachers who otherwise wouldn't be able to come here because they travel and if they didn't have if they had to be home late enough to put their kid on the bus and pick them up and whatnot they wouldn't be able to they wouldn't have the time to get here to get home and so it helps us to recoup higher quality teachers um it's also I think speaks a lot to botel and we have teachers who are here and say this is a great
029school you know I want my kid to come here and in terms of marketing if you know teachers want their own kids this is a school where teachers would want their own children to go to school it I think speaks highly to the quality of Education that we provide but um we in discussion with the board you know decided that the tuition for Teacher students would be the same that we charge coldbrook residents to send CH children to preschool so Mike's question was Al so I I explained that to Mike that you know the board put this into policy as a benefit to teachers um and he questioned whether or not the board had the authority to do that well of course the board does have the authority to do that and I have that
030from our attorney you know and he the attorney at the time had said you can absolutely do it in policy um some districts do it just in policy some districts do it as contractual languages a benefit to teachers so moving forward it might be something that teachers want to incorporate into contract negotiation language but right now if it comes to your attention it's absolutely a legal move on the part of the to put a policy like this in place and it is not atypical there are many districts that provide that kind how many students are ret talk people four so four of our 56 students don't live that's correct and and what's the difference in tuition for cobbrook versus any other town want to sendic K here it that's the only amount that we've had
031was the CBR and the money that we collect for tuition goes directly to the town and it does not cost us any additional money to have these four students here it's not like we had to hire another teacher it's not like you know and when the teachers are apply to have their children come here it's a yearly uh approved Arrangement and they are responsible for transportation they are responsible for any any additional cause so if the child had special ed needs or any other related cost the parent is required to pay for that so we base acceptance on the number of students and clearly we have enough room it's to our advantage to have more kids in our classrooms you know we hear all the time socially it's better for kids to be classro larger
032class sizes so those kids are providing value in that way they're not costing us any additional money and they're not draining our resources in fact the four students that we have here are just delightful bright well behaved children and we're happy to have them so um well that's interesting though because if they weren't delightful and we behaved and they were costing us more that would be a real issue to that policy well no because the board has the right to not Grant the request so have we regant have we approved each of these four requests for these teachers in the and how much do we charge what is $2,000 per student a year a year so $88,000 right now this year in the past it was two children this is the first year that we
033and that money comes in and is passed right to the town so it you offsets the budget hold it and again there's there's there's no downside there's no cost no there got to be some costs I mean like what additional books for four more kids and additional meals perform I mean there are additional costs you can't say there are no additional costs there are pay for their you know we don't we don't pay for studentes um you know if you have to get a subscription for you know 56 as opposed to 52 there have got to be additional you can't make a blank statement there additional process children are grade level so it would be a rare thing that we didn't that we had to get by another book because they usually come in like
034packets of 25 50 75 whatever at a grade level or wherever so um if you're interested in that if the board is interested we can look to see in terms of numbers if in fact we're paying anything else but you know it's usually a school license many of our texts in are online texts um would be good to remember that we discussed when we talked about this policy at the beginning which were how to keep and retain quality teachers how to um bolster our numbers at that time we were also talking about offering tuition widely for reduced costs to lots of different places um so when we talked about this before and whether or not it would be a value added for the for the school we thought in weighing it that it it only
035showed on the positive side I think there's a perception here though whether it's accurate or not that it costs $39,000 per student to educate the kid maybe that's that's the number thr around it's just a very inflated you know I could take this number bottom budget number divide it by 56 and that would be a Val no but I mean there are many ways to work them so I'm saying there's there's the perception that it cost $39,000 to educate our own students and someone else is getting student educ for so that is something that we need to keep in mind and I think that's the big the Genesis for the sort of emails and I I think that that is a perception I think it's an incorrect one because let's say we have someone move
036tomorrow do we then then it cost 46,000 or let's say we have someone move in then it cost 20,000 no those numbers in the same way that you know cost per Road in Nork doesn't make sense cost per student doesn't make sense that way it is not it's not immediate The Exchange that way you know it's the value of having the students in the classroom at at this point for our school we we are Bare Bones of what it can cost to run the school so we will only be bringing down our cost for people if we bring more pupils children aren't aren't like um I don't know nails or or bolts or screws they're not um uniform to same so the the actual cost to educate child pay and the actual a child be
037are going to differ depending on the level of service in well that's what I'm saying that we're bar Fort P four may not be requiring Serv they parents would pay we would notay that's part of the agreement that so for instance important details to to make known because there is a but it's based on false information or incomplete information there there's I don't know we're not increasing the cost to educate our student body by four times $39,000 by inviting these students into the the building and there's a formula and it it's not divide the bottom line of the budget by the number of students Kathy you take you take out Transportation take special yeah and there there's a whole there is a Formula I'm sure whatever number and then you know stud to our student
038body we're not increasing the the cost to the town um by whatever that number is no I understand that understand that but I also I I find it hard to believe there's absolutely zero cost to have anybody student there are to be some cost Walter I don't know what they would be um and we will look at that but I mean at the most basic level it's postage for sending letters home to four different parents there's a cost right there so just to say they're done well we don't mail them home because their parents aren't here so they backpack them um I mean we could really scrutinize this but like this you know we have this one one special ed student that's costing us $214,000 you know another student could really cost nothing um and
039when you look at the cost of the building if you took all the kids out just the building operation costs I mean when you look at the you know the pie the majority of our cost is teacher benefits and salaries huge Lion Share the other is special ed these students if it was special ed their parents would pay wouldn't cost us anything and the only way that the salary benefits piece would be a factor is if we had to hire another teacher because they put the number over so when you look at what is actually paying for students the you know um supplies instruction it's a very teeny kind of thing so it's nowhere near you know um right your right here and so whether you've got 50 kids or 150 kids the difference in
040cost would be teachers and benefits nothing else would really so there's a a a point at which this is what it's going to cost to have a school and the number of kids can fluctuate incredibly and then again until the number at a particular level required another teacher that you're paying a salary and benefits for it's not going to to Really impact what it costs the town to you know to educate a kid so you're right the perception is there but again it it's not it's a faulty perception I think you pleas your your point and Mr Bard's Point actually that we actually have 52 kids here in town so bigger um argument for consolidation in fact I would like to see us add consolidation next month to our agend for discussion okay you know
041I know you know you're you're new to the board but I'm going to tell you that the conversation is not new and if our attorney were sitting at the table he would say it's not the board prerogative we have no authority to initiate consolidation that's not the board's job that's really falls on the town to initiate that and as you know I think the board has had multiple conversations and meetings with colbrook we have extended that invitation they don't want to talk about they don't want to use the word and to put it on the agenda for next month we give us a chance to recap some of the discussions we've already had as a board this year about consolation you know since I've been here the talent has pushed consolidation onto us but we
042don't have that they have literally said we're responsible for initiating that conversation but we don't have authority then we can initiate conversations have ideas for how ini conversations again good I know for fact Matt R's initiating conversations with Selectmen so been happening for a decade so took aside last week to talk about so I would like I agree with you I would like to see this inform thank you yeah call C Brook thank you guys what's your name again Walter Walter godi nice to meet you Michael Mr lozar we would love to have that this love to have um and it's something that we have to advocate for um I have been told by superintendent we had been told that there's absolutely no will and you know no one even wants to talk about now
043recently they've had change of their board and they have a new select me so you know mat told me that the Selman was very receptive to that um I don't know where that was where that has gone but we've not had any information from the first select men for any invitation from cooks town to come to the table you know we we can meet with the board board and we have done we can talk about this next month too but it really is not in the perview of the board and Ed to facilitate that why don't we put we'll put it on the board we'll put it on the agenda for next month we'll talk about it again we talk about what can be done by the board because there are steps that can be
044taken by the board um you know we've gone over these things a few times it is always worth going over them again and making new Orit trips one thing that is so true about schools is every year there's a whole new side players so you know can very often the conversation can change quickly or you know can can change format so let's let's put that on the agenda for next month and we'll we'll talk other questions about the budget the bill any other questions okay all right let's move on to the principal report okay so um last month I kind of gave you the breakdown about where our fall and winter testing was and just as an overview three times a year we do Universal screening of our students and give them various standardized measures
045to look at their growth and performance and this uh time of the year is also when we are giving the smarter balance assessment which is the um assessment that the federal government requires that all students in grades three through eight take so uh we are in the process of doing that right now students have complet completed the English language arts version of the assessment and this week are working on the math uh in two weeks fifth grade will work on the Science assessment and uh we shared with Amy today um that students are working very hard and um are displaying a really positive attitude they are um have been I think they're feeling very prepared and they're taking the assessment uh quite seriously we can see how long each student takes on each of the
046assessments and um the majority of them are taking over an hour some close to an hour and 45 minutes on the different assessments um the assessment changes according to how the student responds so the more correct answers a student gets the more rigorous the test becomes so it adapts to their capabilities and likewise if they give an incorrect answer then you know next series of questions might be um at a slightly lower level but all within the grade level span so we're looking forward to see how they do on that and uh hope to get results in June um in the you know vein of the community connections we have two things um to report one on earth day we invited a variety of community members to come um run a variety of Learning Centers
047for our students we had the Northwestern agriculture teacher and students come and help the students plant uh for a salsa Garden in the community garden we had great Mountain Forest come and take the students on a guided hike we had Miss eileene and Vina from the nor Fork Library come and read a variety of Earth Day texts they donated those texts and then they made seed balls out of you know paper and seeds and you know formed them all together so the kids had a a wonderful time our staff facilitated like a choice time on the playground it went really really well and then um our PTO president Chelsea bottom she works for a local landscaping company and they donated a tree the unity tree that the student council requ ested when we celebrated Unity
048day in the fall so at the very end everybody dug a little dirt planted the the tree and um it's it's lovely so we're looking forward to that um blooming and then in the fall turning orange to represent inclusive practices so that was a big big success we're currently planning with the pto's assistance um an opportunity for our students to March in the Memorial Day Parade so we're going to invite any students who are able to and who are not already marching with another organization to join their school and um and staff uh who can make it to participate in that so we're looking forward to that we also recently had uh Yale the Yale musicians join us for a concert on Friday we had a brass quintet um for those of you H who
049have access to class dojo I don't know if you were able to hear some of those songs but lots of fan favorites from the theme song to SpongeBob SquarePants all the way to Toy Story and concluding with putting on the rits so lots of foot tapping and chair dancing and you know um enthusiastic Applause so the kids really enjoyed that and the staff did too I also have to give a shout out to miss Holly who uh prepared a nice thank you note and so as the musicians were walking up the little early primary kids come marching out with their little you know chart paper Post-It note and they all read it in the hall and they said we've been to three different schools today and we haven't had any thank yous like this so
050I got a great picture of the kids with the musicians and that was lovely we are all prepared for our Upper Intermediate class trip Tri to Nature's Classroom and we are going to uh Charlton Mass the last week in May the um Upper Intermediate parents and the PTO did a great job fundraising and the cost to students is $50 the entire trip not including Transportation would cost upwards of $415 per student so um that was an excellent job well done and that's what I have for you any questions for the Memorial Day do there used to be a hotel Banner that we are in the works on a banner there's one somewhere around yeah I know it exists yes well I think it's on the wall in the in the gym but we are gonna
051make a personalized banner and Amy and I were just talking about that actually we're going to try to get all the kids handprints on the banner and you know yeah so but that doesn't work out we will use that other janner thank you no I appreciate that yep thank you great any questions for the princip all right let's Mo on to our standard committee reports on technology Jo for yeah we met today um we' talked a lot about the starter balance and the steps that taken toare students for that assessment and messaging around the assessment messaging um check in with yourself see how you're feeling today see how ready you are take a break a break get back to it at and the overall feel of the testing this year um with anecdotal evidence is
052that students are less stressed um ready to acknowledge when they get a break take a quick break and get back to work um or say I'm not feeling good today I'm only going to do a couple questions today and do my testing tomorrow so that's been a nice that's not a typical feel for tests when talking to students so it doesn't feel like test as much as it does an opportunity to show what they know um the math and literacy Specialists have been planning um uh thoughtfully planning their time with the Jen teachers the classroom teach teachers um pushing into co- te some lessons pushing into the wi time that's what I what I need so personalized students especially in the fifth and sixth grade they've targeted some lessons to to push into um the
053they on the final unit of the new curricul so um the state passed legislation saying we need to adapt all schools in the state need to adapt um a specific um early one of five specified early literacy curriculum um so we've done that as a board it's the first that we're implementing dates to and what they're finding is that by the fourth and final unit of this year students are recognizing um skills and Str IES that are transferable between different types of units so in a Research Unit here are skills and strategies I can use tools like gra organizers to help me organize the thinking um that in genre or narrative units there are different tools and strategies you can use while you're reading or while you're writing in that in that genre um and
054so the overall effect is that students are challenged but feel ready to accept that challenge because there's a level of familiarity with tools that they're using to tackle these reading and wri skills yeah that that was really [Laughter] Excell and then there's been some really great opportunities for collaboration and those opportunities have been seized by our um librarian um Aaron decki who's um looking at the data in the library in terms of circulation which books are being checked out which types of books are being checked out um she report last meeting that she looked at the um circulation data last year and reorganized the entire Library into genre specific sections and now students can identify I love books in this section because it's science fiction I love books in this section because it's non-fiction um
055and that the effect of that reorganizing the library increased circulation so she dove into those numbers again realized that a lot of the certification graic novels and so she's organized a chapter book challenge um and she's pushing into the last literacy unit um in terms of their research to find different resources we don't have them in our building tapping into the inter Library Lo system to get resources for students so that they have what they need for their literacy unit I think that it great thank you very much um I'm going to move down to the communications committee and uh use that to talk again about this survey at I person I apologize that I didn't get it done for the May issue of for now but I think June might be a better time
056for it to be um after our last I'm was GNA P this and pass around at our last meeting we talked about adjusting it to have a picture of children rather than the building so um that is in place on this piece now um I also looked up the costs for the uh insert um alter was thinking that the insert was worth it um I wrote the cost in the back I've already forgotten say something so page 170 insert 25 or 465 color yeah thank you so a full page would be you know integrated into the magazine you know it would be like one of the pages in the thing and insert is like a free stand um I have an example of that and I neglected to share this if you haven't seen it
057beautiful and four of the five students featured are nor students um botel students yeah botel students so you know um Ben cron and Jenny derbo and Samantha Bara Gallow and Alex F all former graduates Fel graduates which if you haven't seen it it's yeah the wear in Fr was great um so the uh yeah so if we are good good with this I now think I have all the pieces together um and uh we just need to decide if we want to uh if if we're comfortable with the full page cost the the partial page cost is more like is like $40 so this is a significant jump but I do think it'll have a bigger back um and if we want it to be in the book 170 or as an insert 215 I
058don't know that color is worth it that's a jump to 465 but want to see what you think personally I like it I don't know it has to be its own insert I think it could be a full page inserts fall out totally I absolutely agree and I so the only reason to and I think um it's nice and early now so I will um let norw now know or now so that they will plan for it and then it will be issue okay great well so if anybody has any I will also send this email see if you look at it more closely but if anybody has any their changes or adjustments or Corrections um okay that that's the bummer so that that insert um Eevee was published in the Mad River Anthology for
059the college a piece of her artwork and uh it was from a grant from the Foundation that sponsored the mentor program that she did so I wish I would have known about that we probably just missed getting her in that as well been awesome I think they're gonna make it I think they're gonna try to make that an annual thing right for the that journal that theel Arts folks are trying to the student boys the youth Bo I think it's um Kim Crome Hillary van right both of them both of them work on that so keep keep it in mind well and you know additional bragging about our kids um if you didn't get to see Mary Poppins it was just spectacular and just about every lead part was played by a botel student and
060I think there years of being exposed to theater participating in our annual drama play Productions had given them that experience of auditioning and that stage presence and that experience of performing in and they just they knocked the auditions knocked them out of the park and they were unbelievable and to sit there and watch these kids who we knew as little kids up on the stage pois and just the performance was was absolutely amazing and AD living as the characters during breakfast oh just quite I missed the breakfast but I how did I didn't I I heard it was attended I I met with some people there was Touch a Truck Event just after that but i a l people please great excellent um so uh down to let's see p um very our last meeting
061the PTO has sponsored a teacher and staff appreciation this week um and a bus driver appreciation week which I forget which we um and hosted movie night here um the next uh event planned is the fifth and sixth grade dance on May 17th um and that has been a fundraising source for the Nature's trip Nature's Classroom trip for the 5ifth and six grade students um so that will the money race now I don't know if it will go to this year's fth and six year it be next year um Andor graduation to set graduation um and then after that we're looking at June 7th which would be the first Friday night on the green co-hosting the go and um The Hub co-hosting a family fun night um to get a DJ karaoke machine um and
062inviting our um families to come up and show off their talent with pizza and and I think just volunteered what kind of wrapping up for this year great that's fantastic um John's not here but I believe the School Safety and Security committee would have met since our last meeting do you want is there anything to report there they met in April I think John didn't wasn't that the second oh maybe it was late enough because we delayed our meeting so maybe pretty sure but the the board of Finance we we went to the board of Finance meeting last month would you like talk about um yes I can think back that far we had just just received numbers as the board end that day and um adopted a revised budget which was then presented to
063the board of Finance um they delayed their vote until um but the board Finance it's the right word they didn't adop our budget they approved approved approved our budget and brought it forward to the budget hearing which was last week um there were a couple questions about the botel budget um from members of the public um MTH and I stay back to address members of the public and and reach out and um I'll provide some more information and um I am going to be here until the last person leave nobody's it's not our meeting but there are questions for the board eved that are being answered not by the Board of Ed and so I just after the meeting ended stood up and said I'm a board member and I'm standing right here wants to
064come talk me and then I hunted them down great job good for you than well done great um thank you very much um EDC yeah the EDC is really working on the Norfork looking forward project the last meeting was focused on affordable housing what does affordable housing mean um you know the idea that the town has to come up with a working definition of what it means for norfor because one of the subgroups from that um looking forward project was affordable housing the other just in case you don't recall and hopefully I will remember what they are um it's you know like restaurants things in the center of town Infinity Hall um affordable housing and children's programming were the big um topic that came from that work so again last month was all on affordable
065housing there was a representative from Kent I believe they had done some work with their employers uh who you know reached out to the employees and just inquired do you live in town you know if not why not you know just kind of getting some information so they could uh determine if there was anything that they could do at the Town level to you know again recruit people to live in town work in town and and whatnot so um that was very informative and um there's another looking forward meeting coming up the different groups meet and then report back I wasn't able to go on the 24th that's when all the groups got together so the meeting is Thursday I'm sure I'll be brought up to speed on what happened there excellent thank you very
066much okay um let's move on on our on our agenda to unfinished business the community outreach coordinate uh do you want to talk to us a bit about that um hello um I know you gave the description the job description to the board to read there hasn't been a followup discussion in terms of like next steps and like um if it's I can reach out you know if it's something that's a board but I I can reach out to Libby and begin to look at her sources for um funding that position we've already had a pretty long meeting one of we why don't we put this on our agenda again for next time and I'll ask everyone to take a look at that again maybe I'll resend it out because I know give yes the
067coordinator the Outreach coordinator the idea is simply to try to get someone to work with the school and the community to be that person in between so we had put together that uh that little job description and wanted to to kind of send it up to the EDC and see if they how they felt about it whether or not they would be interested in funding it or portion of their sharing rece see where that goes I mean if if you all feel like you want to talk about it now or give your thoughts on it now I'd like to play wet blanket again today um you know it's wor it seems to me that it's based on the premise of cating an extended dat and I don't know if the board prior to M has
068discussed whether not that is something that is a goal but I haven't had discussions about an extended date program think that's it well I don't think it's only about an extended day program although I do think that is an important piece that that extended day program has come up quite a bit for Community with Community interest asking asking for it to happen here well but we're talking about our team I'm assuming that's a bitel team so that means that we need to be able to adopt these you know I don't care if liby's pushing it or who's pushing it I think we need to have a discussion as to whether or not an extended day program is something that we're looking at have yeah um there's talk about a competitive salary health insurance retirement savings
069opportunities for development and advancement with advance to what um you know I look at this chart and say who's going to pay for the salary and then if we're have benefits those are an extra 25% of the salary where is this money coming from unless it's fully funded and that unless it is fully funded I don't want to see one pen of North taxpayer money going into a marketing position and this is and she has looking for sources this and and I made that clear that the school not only financially but in terms of facilitating and managing that's beyond our scope and Libby is looking to find funding to have it be a community employee it would not be a botel employee we would not be in charge of this it would not be our
070if we would provide facility we would collaborate with this position but I've made a that it's not in our budget we don't intend to put it in our budget and it's something that we have put in place in the past not successfully in spite of attempts to reach out to parents what would you like we did do the survey Amy I didn't bring that result with you but we did ask kids but we've asked kids what would we like to do we've had volunteers PTO has done extended programs we've offered you know transportation and parents are just no we don't it it hasn't worked so when I said to Li before you move forward on funding finding funding for a position like this let us put out a little something to parents we put out
071this fire that said you know we are looking to see and having you know programs in the community extended day or otherwise you know would you be at all interested in you know um having your child participate in any number of these kinds of things we had two responses I think seven seven okay and I had were two so I said to Libby before you go down this road and invest time and money if there's not an interest in a demand it's really spending a lot of time but so she put the breaks on that but one was interested in you know coming up and I don't think it's just about an extended day program so the idea being that if we are going to have a school that attracts people to move to town
072for our school what could we do to make it more appealing how can it be more uh iMed in the community how can we use the wonderful resources that our community has and offers how can we use them effectively and it can be hard to figure out how best to to find those resources organize those resources Implement their programming so I think having someone dedicated to that piece could be really valuable and so to me like marketing the School makes sense for the town if we're thinking of it as a way to change the demographic of our town then we need to invest in so I just go back to perception I I think there's a real there there's a a large segment of North society that does not view this school fabor BL and
073I think that if you know particularly with this latest budget round where we had last minute increases and every article read about you know we're the top where the first thing they say you know everyone else tighten their belts except the school what so you know I think if there's a person brought in to do marketing as we would have to make it so clear that there is not a scent not one I mean even the programming if it means we're going to have to run buses that are coming out school budget that can't happen because there I think we will have towns folks with torches ready to burn the school down if they find out we're using money for marketing purposes we have to be so careful here so a couple like a thing
074one unfortunately I think the Crux of marketing this school to town to people give it in their town all has to be for I mean it's a way simpler answer then it should be unfortunately no young unless they're but the the other part of that or my other suggestion could this be an internship I think there are plenty of institutions of higher education that would look at this as an excellent opportunity for an internship and we can do for free that's a fantastic idea about the community college would be great place the Community College might be or I don't know if there's folks that are Advanced enough into that rule that we may need to call in western or Central but but I mean I think we can start with the community college for sure
075I think there is um a lot of ill will toward the school I me that is much easier to talk about I think that's much more fun to talk about and I think that there's very little interest in finding out more about the school um as evidenced by the fact that there are very few members of the public who come to these meetings thank you to find out listen of course thank you for being here um as evidenced by the fact that notes are delivered to people to invite them to events and those people don't show up that things are advertised um to show off the The Amazing progress our students are making we don't see community members come to curriculum night come to the spring concert come to the school play come to see
076um events that are happening here so if you don't see it for firsthand you don't have information to combat the you know well we could just write a check for $25,000 to every kid and then send them off to indan Mountain that's incomplete and inaccurate information but that's the sound bite that gets passed around the town and we don't have an effective tool to stop that sound bite correct the misinformation or incomplete information and if they're wearing internship because I agree I don't want to add to that P I don't want to P I'm a taxpayer here um but if there were another tool in our belt to help at least feed more information about the school and what we do and what makes it a great place to send your kid then we can
077have a better chance to stop the rumor mail that just repeats the negative repeats the negative doesn't come to the school doesn't have anything new to say except I heard something more about money um so I I would love to to help support a position without having I can I can start the process of feasibility and internship I like I said we can do it for free and I think that we might have someone really energized and not only that we won't have like starting off that can do parttime job yeah I think baby steps are maybe the way to go expert in someone with energy and then someone overseeing it that's kind of senior which might be better than us getting an entry level person or a person who's in the retirement because I
078this is not an attractive job because it's not enough hours it's not enough pay or whatever I would think I mean I mean it's kind of attractive for a part-time job but not a lot of people looking for part-time jobs right now and I think that's really generous that you to offer I would suggest that you contact liby because this has been initiated by EDC this is not something that was initiated by the board and you know the EDC over the last few years has switched the tune from if botel was this great school people would want to move here so their kids could go here hotel is a great school people can't afford to live here and now finally economic development is talking and focus is on affordable housing because if families can't afford
079to buy a home if they don't have the infrastructure for people to work remotely you're not going to have young families move here this is a a lifestyle choice you know and you don't have Ikea and stop and shop and all the the things that a lot of families want and the housing is not affordable so you know there it's it's a big big thing but I think you're right you know it's it's loow hanging fruit oh it's the school costing all this money and the school's not good I don't know where that comes from because I've been in this business over 45 years this is a phenomenal school this school offers more to kids and does more for kids than it it's it's it's like private school um you look at the class size
080sure we want more kids but you know you talk to any teacher like class size of 13 14 oh my gosh you know it it's the opportunities for for our kids here are amazing I don't think that you know that is going to what whatever you do to the botel isn't going to make people move here they need to be able to afford a I think the other piece of this is that we we are trying as a town to recruit some young families I mean you look at the um volunteer ambulance and the volunteer fire department they are desperate for younger members um it is a it is a town issue not just a botel issue that um we have so few young families and that imbalance of the town has an effect on
081um on more aspects than just the school but it it um it does affect the school the school integral piece of the town the demographics of the town and the ability to attract famili is the integral piece of the the school so having somebody feet in both of those worlds and and being able to help both sides of that coin move forward and and Market Market hotel I think I I would be willing to support them so it sounds like what I'm hearing from our board is that um we would be open to the idea of the EDC pursuing a position like this um provided that it does not add to the botel budget um we could give suggestions for internships within oversight by uh by a supervisor um but that uh the concept of
082having a person who would be able to um kind of coordinate between Town efforts and Bothel programming we would be open to that if if it could come together I think we'd be open to but the the real messaging here is going to be with respect to you know our team our cause our mission which is what I see all over this description then we almost need to have last say over whatever that message we have we need to control this position without paying for it I I would agree with that the EDC run wild and start messaging about something that we don't well I mean so it's a it's a fine line we don't want to have to pay for anything but we need to have last final control final word on everything well
083because what happens at school there you know it isn't a private school it's a public school we have state standards that we have to follow we have testing we have to deliver their sorry and we have to be careful about the messaging we put out well I mean we can't just all of a sudden you know say oh you know hey we're gonna Market ourselves as a outdoor like no that you know so it needs to be thought and not that it wouldn't be thought but I do feel strongly that you know there are teachers and students involved in this and teachers you know they have a important job to do in curriculum to deliver and students to raise and there lot players voices Pard there are a lot of players who should have voices
084in this I agree there are so L goingo that that should be advertised that is work people knowing about without changing the school right um I'm not saying you know let's be static and not do anything but I think we have a lot that that should be trumpeted that should be out there that that needs help getting out there so and in terms of this description when Ann asked me to put something together I prefaced it by saying this is something everything is in there but the kitchen that's right for the board to look at and say what would we want this to be paired down to to share with EDC and again in my conversations with Libby it's like we have to have a loud voice limited responsibility for finances or the work involved
085so she knows that that's you know the position that the superintendent I believe representing the board is but this was like first step and so I guess I would like to go back to my um original thought of putting this on our agenda with Cons with consolidation to talk about to to ask everyone to look closely at that job description and you know get the red pen out you know and make suggestions and then uh have a more of a workshop idea because it sounds like we're not maybe quite ready to go back to liby with a with a cohesive board resp so should I not reach out to her before we do some of that or should I have like maybe an informal conversation I feel comfortable with you having an informal conversation I
086feel like that I want this to become board project so if we start going up on our own so I think just talking to her I don't know we're having this conversation and here some ideas and thank you guys very much you outside the yard day we're at the end of our agenda so um I'd be looking for a motion to aurn move motion seconded all those in favor you