001All right. Good evening, East Hampton School Board. Uh, we're streaming to YouTube. Phone lines are open. This meeting is being recorded and you may begin. >> Thank you very much. Welcome. >> Can I have a motion to call the meeting to make the motion? >> Second. >> All in favor? Please rise [Music] of indivisibley and justice for all. >> Thank you all very much. [Music] >> Thank you all for coming. Uh, as you may or may not know, uh, next week is board appreciation week, and this has become an annual tradition for our schools to show the talent they have for our board of education. I want to personally thank the board for all they do for this community. As you may or may not know, the board are volunteers. Um, so this is really
002the joy that they get. Uh, it's not meeting with me, it's seeing what the kids do. So, uh, let's start off with the, uh, elementary school. delighted to introduce Mr. Greg Butler and students from Mrs. Durtis' first grade class. >> Thank you. Thank you for having us here. And >> and I just want to say uh Amelia, Mia, Sierra, and May and Leah and Chloe and Ariana is here to perform for us right now. >> Let's give them a hand. [Music] I love the river. [Music] Peace like a river. >> I got peace like a river. I got peace like a river. >> One more. I've got love like an ocean. >> I've got love. >> I' got love like an ocean. >> Sounds good. A little louder. I' got love like an ocean. >>
003I got love. Good job. [Music] >> Tippy toes. I' got I got joy like a fountain. I got joy like a fountain in my soul. In my soul, joy like a fountain. >> I got [Music] peace, love, and joy like forever. I love I love peace of joy in my [Music] peace and joy. I got peace and joy in my soul. First graders, that was amazing. >> The partners we randomly will get. You can go across down across and you're going to help me play piano. >> Come your Maymay and your partner, you're going to sache down first. This is a New England traditional dance called Chimes of Dunkerk. Forward and back. Right hand turn. [Music] Two hands. [Music] Here they come. Move down everyone. Sache girls. Forward and back. Can't turn. [Music] Two hands
004skipping. Here they come on down. [Music] Here [Music] [Applause] [Music] they come. [Applause] Go over here. Come over here. Come go come. [Music] I want to do it again. [Music] Mr. [Music] Yes, I'm going to [Music] Thank you. Well, thank you to our school board for all of your volunteer service. We do appreciate it. And this group is actually an outgrowth of the support that you provide. This is our select chamber orchestra which is going now into its third year. So it is a club experience after school for students who are part of the larger orchestra and it's um conductor and one of our been a very popular music teacher Mr. Thorough is here tonight to talk to you a little bit about the piece and he's also going to introduce issues. Turn it over
005to Mr. Thorough. Thank you. Thank you for everything that you do to allow us to make great music at every age level there. Um, today we're going to be playing Sailor Song by Mark Williams. And I'd like to introduce our members that we have here. This is the uh seven members that have continued from last year. And this ensemble has actually grown to about 15 students with the addition of sixth graders joining this year. A very large group. On violin, we have Janice and Andreas. On the cello we have Brian. And then on the viola we have John, Mark, and Monzerat. And then on bass we have [Music] Come on. Down. [Music] Thank you. Just before Miss Smith comes up, I want to let everybody know the uh the high school culinary program under the
006direction of Miss Ross provided the board with dinner this evening. We'll take it anytime. >> We've hired you. speak on behalf of the high school tonight capstone program that I was so fortunate to be involved in since it was brought to the high school back in 2017 by Mr. Fine and Mr. Braum. Um, so to our board of education, thank you so much for your continued commitment for providing diverse educational opportunities for our students as you saw tonight through our culinary program. Now to our capstone program. Our capstone program is an innovative twocourse sequence developed by the college board. It was designed to equip students with critical skills in research, analysis, collaboration, and communication through two courses, AP Seminar and AP research. The program was created to go beyond traditional content knowledge and prepare students
007for the demands of college level work and the 21st century workforce by fostering critical thinking, creativity, and independent inquiry. It helps students become more confident, self-directed learners ready to succeed in higher education and beyond. Tonight, we have the pleasure of hearing from three exceptional high school students. seniors who have completed the rigorous AP capstone program. These Koflings, Shirley Chang, and Griffin Beckman will be sharing their personal experiences and insights from this challenging and rewarding academic journey. Each of them has navigated the demands of AP seminar and AP research, gaining valuable skills again in critical thinking, research, communication. So, let's welcome Leaves, Shirley, and Griffin as they tell us what this program has meant for them. >> Good evening. My name is Lee Coop and I'm a senior at Eastampton High School. So, I on behalf
008of the student body would like to thank you guys personally for all you do, especially with the capstone program. Um, it definitely taught me important skills that have helped me in my high school career and will continue to help me in my college. I really want to touch upon the creative aspect of the class, both AP seminar and AP research. I found that, you know, most traditional classes, you have a strict curriculum and you have strict due dates, assignments that prepare you for, say, AP tests or regions at the end of the year. So, when I had the choice, it kind of surprised me and I didn't know what direction to go. And so for example with AP research I just wanted to have the comfort of having a topic right away. So I was
009like you know people are putting cell phones in the pockets that was like this little system to try to decrease phone use. And so I was like I'll try and research that. And so just having that comfort kind of made me feel good. Although once I started the research process I realized that there wasn't uh anything I could really add to the you know literature review or there wasn't any pictures and it wasn't that presentable. So then I kind of rethought the process, sat down with my teacher, Miss Flight, who was very influential in both AP seminar and research and decided to look into the BLC program at RU High School. This is the blind learning center. It is an alternative online after school program that helps with makeup credit and helps increase graduation rates.
010And so looking back at the experience, I was able to learn that, you know, you don't have to just jump straight in just to say you have a topic. it's better to really think about it and see if there's um you can add to the review of literature and if it's presentable and if it's something you're passionate about then you'll have more in depth research about it. I also want to talk about how it helped my presentational skills. Um playing into the creativity aspect of the class we did have templates and examples of those for our big presentations. However, it was still up to you how you wanted to format it, what colors you wanted to use, the style you wanted to use. And I kind of spent a lot of hours kind of, you
011know, finalizing my life. So, making sure I enjoyed it a lot. >> And so, I just thought that this was very helpful. It also taught me how to use bulleted like making it bulleted and having images so that people weren't just reading words and were actually engaged in the slideshow. And then it was my job to use note cards and explain in further detail. So, I just want to thank you guys again. uh AP cap capstone program has helped me a lot and will definitely help me in my college careers. >> Thank you. >> Hey, my name is Shirley J and I also wanted to start out by thanking the board of education and all the teachers for the endless support and the AP capstone program that has provided me with many skills that will
012carry on into the future. One of the most important skills I've learned is public speaking. Growing up, I've always been nervous and anxious to present in front of others because for me, it was a test to put my um fluency of the English language on full display. I didn't start learning English until I was 7 years old and I was always insecure about my pronunciations. Presenting me that there was a chance that I was going to butcher words in front of people. I remember one time in Mr. Smith's sixth grade science class. We had to bring in an example of physical working change from our house and we had a presentation. Even though all we had to do was to um say our names, state the object and state whether if it was a physical
013or chemical change. I was shaking when I got to the front of the class to present. To make matters worse, I was saying a vitamin instead of vitamin because I thought it was a mandarin cognit. But Mr. Smith tried to piece out my butcher vitamin as I brought as all I brought in was an orange tablet with my dogs on it. But for the first time, I was reassured rather than embarrassed for misprononunciation. So I figured out that the only way to get over my fear was to present more in front of people. Besides taking AP seminar and AP research, I realized that I can become a public speaker when I have something to say and with confidence and master the content and there were people who wanted to listen to my interests and research.
014I remember making a joke during my AP research AP research presentation last year on the modified racial triangulation in Crazy Rich Asians the film. It made me felt really good because I was more than perceptive. I was engaging my audience. to expand on my topic. Oftentimes in films, there is a racial translation that takes place where the minority groups are never fully accepted by the dominant group which usually follows the patterns of whites, Asians, Asian Asians, Asian-Americans, and African-Americans. Since Crazy Rich Asians was an all Asian cast film, I wanted to test if there's a presence of a modified racial triangulation with traditional Chinese, Chinese Americans and sisters. We are of course without I had the chance to become an expert on niche topics in both classes and it allowed me to build confidence in
015delivering my message and in addition to my understanding of the topic. I'm very grateful for all the support and opportunities this program has provided me with. And I can definitely see myself with more confidence in developing my voice and communicating my research in the future. And when that doesn't work, I'll just pretend everyone is a catch for the last time. [Music] Uh hello board members and all those attend attendance tonight. My name is Rean Beckman. I'm also a senior at East High School here on the behalf of the student body to thank you all for the educational opportunities you provide to us in high school on the day-to-day specifically highlighting the AP capstone program for the classes of AP seminar and AP research. I've taken both of these classes and thoroughly enjoyed almost every single
016day of them and they were really great experience and granted so much exposure to sort of real world applicable concepts and also practices that I still use today. I'll be highlighting the amount that AP seminar and AP research helped me to develop my academic writing and also reading comprehension and a little bit of media literacy um through these classes. I've always really appreciated the art of writing, especially academic or higher level writing as it allows you to communicate a point without necessarily being face to face with someone or maybe even breaking the boundaries of language or distance or accessibility whatever may. I started AP seminar in the 10th grade and initially um on the first week of classes we were required to read peer-reviewed articles and other scholarly sources as a means to sort of
017like garner background information on the topic we'd be studying. Uh the IWA the individual written argument was the first paper we would write and so by reading these peer-reviewed articles we were educating ourselves on the topics we hope to pursue in these written arguments. It was really critical that we actually understood what we were reading and so my comprehension my reading comprehension skills had to seriously develop and get up to the bar that AP seminar required at the time. So just by getting the exposure to those I seriously think that that helped me. uh reading comprehension did not stop at all until or subreion carried right into AP research as well as we had to read a much larger volume and also higher level reading uh through more peer-reviewed articles and scholarly sources as well.
018Uh these were all to inform our decisions and becoming as Shirley said experts in the field of our topics of choice. Um but generally it really did help me in that field. to sort of piggy back off of the writing uh came the reading came the writing which had to sort of mimic and be up to the standards of the reading we were doing in class. Uh as I said before the IWA the first paper we wrote really did have to push our bounds of what we considered like a standard convent standard conventions of English. uh we had to use much more advanced vocabulary and also uh sort of like fit within word counts, limits and then also incorporate uh complex sentence structures and all sorts of uses of the English language which we might
019not have been familiar with before. I really developed my writing in my opinion seminar and continue to do so in research. uh through our writing, we really had to be specific and sort of hyper specific about our word choices when writing as we were often limited by word count and also when developing research questions, hypotheses and then also just kind of defining your topic in general. uh for in research I decided to study the impact of bilingual education employed in the ENL system on the climate change perceptions of ENL earth science students uh to sort of test test accessibility within the realm of climate science and also climate change as well. And I was really glad to have had the skills developed in AP seminar carry over to research and be able to make those
020connections in reading and writing and sort of like enhance my sentence structure. Uh and then also media literacy was sort of woven throughout as you navigate all of these different texts uh be it scholarly sources or peer-reviewed articles. You do have to really gauge what you consider to be bias or maybe a lack of bias, something that's reliable or credible to use in a source. And so we through repeated practice, we really became great at uh really gauging bias and what might be applicable and what might be usable in the text and what might not be. uh and I still continue to use that to this day. Maybe when evaluating where I get my news from or other sources of information as well. The skills I learned in reading, writing and media literacy also carried
021into other classes within the high school that I saw such as the science research program which is a great program within our high school. Um it similarly required us to read peer-reviewed articles, scholarly sources and then compose uh sort of like advanced written works in research plans uh research proposals or even summations of what we've been doing in the class. I really saw these writing skills being developed. Uh on top of that, when applying for such as when applying for lead times at Brook Haven National Lab over the summer, I had to write up an entire research proposal to convince the sort of like administration of ENL that I was worth giving the intern to that people all around the world for. And I was able to achieve that and I really do attribute a
022lot of that to seminary. And then beyond the classroom, I've also been able to use my writing skills to advance a lot of my goals and missions in life in general. I've written to local and state legislature to advocate for environmental conservation uh laws such as the one for Horseshoe Prab. And I'm really happy that I was able to compose a letter in such a way that was able to impress or even just in some way uh convince our governor and also local governments to really take action in a way that has an impact. So yet I really do thank you guys so much for all the educational opportunities you provide and I will continue to use all the lessons I've learned in these classes throughout my high school, college and overall [Applause] >> I
023I have a question. So the the seminar on the research that's in junior year. Is that all junior or is it sophomore year to junior year? Junior. >> Yes. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you very much. >> Yeah. Well, to top it off, I mean, I know this has really impressed you thoroughly as it has of course. Um, what's even better, I think we um turn over to Sam and we're going to get our external oil, you know, >> and you guys could get out of here. >> Unless you want to do research on our external order. So, um, I'd like to introduce Jen Da. Jen Da, she's a partner with Colin Donowski. This is our external auditor. The district has three different auditors, different functions here. our federal auditors will look at
024our books and records that are prepared by Mr. Treasur at the end of the year and pass judgment as to whether or not we are accurate in what we're presenting to the public and to examine how we conduct our financial affairs and pass judgement as well. Jen, thanks for being here. >> Thank you. Really hard to follow that. I promise you this is not as uh exciting information. Um so yes, we we we uh performed the external audit for the year ended June 30th uh 2025. Um we offered um we gave an opinion of what is called unmodified opinions which means that the statements present fairly and they are materially accurate. Um that doesn't mean that there could be some errors in in there. Um it's just not material. um to financial statements. So overall,
025the district did really well. They ran a surplus $446,000 for the year. Um so that's your revenues over expenditures. Um your revenues came in $3.6 million. Over the prior year, you um expended 3.8 million more than last year. Um all within budget. your reserves are at a total of $20 million which is adequate in the healthy reserves. Um so overall good job um administration here. We also had um some management letter comments um which went really well. We had seven comments last year. Um, five of which were addressed immediately by the administration and two of them were outside of the business office. So really well done job by both Jamie and I would only add that the audit committee reviewed the audit in detail with Jen when we had our meeting September and ask questions
026Jen questions now there's an item on the agenda a little bit later for permission to accept the audit and file the state. >> Great. Thank you. >> Everybody involved in the process. Thank you and Jamie. Great job. >> Thank you again. >> And we're very pleased with our order >> and and truthfully, they're pleased with us. >> Yes. >> Thank you very much. Thank you. >> Okay. So, I just make you go to the podium. What are we doing with this? Where you feel comfortable? Where do you want to do it from? >> Um, well, this is really just what I talked about last time, but the homecoming game went really well. Everyone's really happy dominated, so that was really good. um game result the pet band I heard really good um comments about also
027the cheerleading squad was really good I was in the band so it's kind of hard to see but it sounded nice um high turnout and also the bands went really well everyone was really excited about using the patio and we had the new um game gaming section and that went really well so it was really fun um the Hispanic heritage fair last Friday was really, really great. Also, high turnout. And thank you to all the families, students, and teachers that helped out and organized, especially Miss Renb who really running everything. It went super smoothly. And the only thing coming up is the health fair. >> Thank you very much. Anybody here have a public comment? LTV, do you have anybody on the phone for public comment? >> We have no callers on the line. >>
028We have the uh approval of the consent agenda. Can I have a motion to accept a motion? Second. All >> in favor? Opposed? So, superintendent reports and recommendations. Number one, recommend the board approve the nonstrual appointment of Sophie Walters. This is provisional term appointment system commencing October 22nd, 2025. I have a motion. I'll >> make a motion. Second. >> Second. >> Discussion replacement. >> All in favor? Any opposed? Two. Recommend that the board approve the non-interruptible appointments of Mark Bennett to the position of school bus driver. Have a motion. >> I'll make a motion. Second. >> Second. >> Discussion. Thank you. >> Board. All in favor? Any any opposed? Number three. Recommended the board approve the non instructional appointment of Maria Guanga to the position of school bus driver. Have a motion. Make a motion.
029>> Second. >> Any discussion? Thank you for joining us. We can always use a bus driver. Both went through the training program. >> Our own training. >> Excellent. >> But how are we doing? Do we have enough? Are we good for now? >> Always looking for more. >> Always looking. >> I'll take our bus company over at any other bus company in >> I agree. just to hear some local names pop up and and Mark is someone I've known for a long time. He's a fire chief. He's a community person. It's nice to see. >> All in favor? >> Any opposed? >> We were talking about the bus drivers. >> All right. Number four, I recommend the board approve the non-instructional appointment of Craig Thomas Riley, the position of professional. Make a motion. Second discussion
030in favor. Number five, uh, recommend the board approve the instructional appointment of Margarita Digs to the position of English teacher placement. I have a motion. >> Make a motion. Second. >> Second. I think the discussion report tells us what we're doing. So, that's good. All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Number six, recommend the board approve Christine Reese as the uh member of of the 202526 school year mentor. I'm sorry. 25 minutes of school year. I have a motion motion. >> Second discussion >> the mentor. We have mentors for a teacher citizen additional mentor for >> years clubs on the agenda. Okay. >> I think from time to time you're going to see more. >> All in favor? >> Any opposed? Number seven. Recommend the board by approve the following extra activity advisor agreement
031for the 202526 school year. Motion. >> Any discussion? Starting to see these now agenda. Got it. All in favor? Any opposed? Number eight. Um recommended the board approve the student trip trip trip trip trip trip trips for the 202526 school year. I have a motion. >> Motion second. >> Any discussion? >> All in favor? >> Any oppos? Right. >> Number nine. I recommend the board of education approve the district safety plan for the 202526 school year. Is that a motion? >> Make a motion. Second. >> Second. discussion. >> This is the updated version with the cardio cardio how to do this. Yep. >> All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? See 10. Recommend the board approve the budget transfer for 202526 school year. I have a motion. >> Make a motion. >> Second. >>
032Any discussion? >> All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Number 11. recommend that we're accepted with gratitude the following donations. I have a motion. >> I'll make a motion. >> Second. >> Discussion. Want to thank our donors very much. Much appreciated. >> All in favor? >> I 12 recommended that the board approve the following contract agreements for the 202526 school year. I have a motion. >> Make a motion. Second. >> Second. Any discussion? >> All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Number 13. I recommend the board accept the annual external audit report from Tullen and Dowski LLP for the fiscal year ending June 30th, 2025. Can I have a motion? >> I'll make a motion. Second what we just heard. >> All in favor? >> Any opposed? Okay, we are now through that
033catch up here. Old business, we've got nothing. back to public comment against anybody have a public comment. LTV, do you have a public comment? >> Yeah. Stand by. >> You maybe have someone. No way. >> Been like three years. >> Don't get too excited. This is Matt Sharon. I'm actually calling from LCD studio. We just want to We just want to confirm that the phone lines are up and operational. Thank you. Oh, there's another word. Thank you, Matt. >> All right. Uh, >> sure. Just a reminder to the community, uh, we have a bond, uh, community forum next week, Wednesday, at 6 pm. >> All are welcome. >> Absolutely. >> Yes. >> Okay. Motion to >> adjourn. Second move. We move.