001But that doesn't stop. Yeah. Right. Good evening everyone. Can we please all take a seat? Okay. So, as you know, this is a special board of education meeting and I would like to call the meeting to order at 7:35. So, uh for the board members, can I have a motion, please? Mr. Greco, seconded by Miss Lington. Um all in all in favor, opposed any abstensions. Great. All right. So, can everyone please stand for the pledge? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you so much. Please take a seat. Okay, I want to welcome everyone to our uh second uh meeting uh in May. Um especially with the weather like uh
002outside and everyone's still uh getting here. So that was amazing. And then right now I would like to uh introduce uh Mr. Scott Duber, our director of athletics, physical education and recreations, who will recognize our winter student athletes for yours. Good evening and thank you. And I first want to apologize to everyone for the parking situation today. Uh obviously we're are hosting a very large track event, aa county championship where the majority of our track athletes are still competing. So, I hope we were able to get a good parking spot. I want to say good evening and I'd like to thank the board of education, Dr. Rogers, and the entire administrative team for your continued support of our outstanding athletic program and allowing me to share some of the highlights from this past winter. We
003had another great season, including six Nassau County Championships and three Long Island Championships. With all of their success this winter, I'm also proud to share once again for the third consecutive year, all of our athletic teams have qualified for the NISFA New York State Scholar Athlete Distinction, which is 75% or more of the roster. Has a overall average of 90 or better. It's a tremendous accomplishment and a testament to our commitment to not only being athletes, but student athletes. So, congratulations. We have uh you know a lot of young men young men and women who are here to be recognized and I'm going to start off with uh introducing a member of our boys bowling team, Mr. Jaden Ing. I know Coach Drommy is upset he couldn't be here, but it was his wife's birthday
004and he didn't want to get in trouble. So he I've had the opportunity to watch Jaden Bold past couple years and he had an outstanding season. He had a 213 average earning him all county honors for Sioset. He was the runner up in the Nassau County individual championship and he also rol rolled two 300 games during the season. Congratulations Jaden. And the good news is we get to see him bowl for us a little more. So big things to come. So, thank you very [Applause] much. Uh, next up, we're going to recognize our girls um Nassau County and Long Island Championship basketball team. Uh, we have one member here tonight who I would like to recognize. So, I'm going to introduce Miss Leila Abraham. So, I know we had a lot of our basketball players
005who were also um playing flag football and unfortunately they lost the championship tonight, so we were missing some of them. Having been a watching the girls basketball team the past three years and I've watched Ila on the court. Um she's the epitome of a great teammate. She's always at practice, one of the first ones in the gym, always competing, giving her best. Um, I think the highlight for me was watching her have a key, uh, key points in the Nassau County Championship game coming off the bench. Uh, again, she's just she's what you want all student athletes to be. So, congratulations, Ila, and congratulations to the girls. And at this time, it brings me great pleasure to introduce our boys basketball head coach, Mr. Greg Cardona. [Applause] Good evening. So, I just want to congratulate
006Thomas Martelli for being named All County this season. I've been coaching for 16 years, and Thomas is a kid that doesn't come around very often. Um, a kid who has extremely high character. He works hard at practice every day, takes it serious every day, uh, extremely coachable, and also a very good basketball player. This year, he averaged 17 points per game. uh first game of the season. He scored 31 points. And I just want to honor Thomas Martelli as an allcount [Applause] player. Thank you, coach. Thank you, Tom. And at this time, I'd like to introduce some some members of our um Nassau County Champion went boys win the track team. So I'm gonna introduce them all now. Come on out. First we have our all county in 55 meter sprinter. He's also a member
007of our baseball team, but he in the winter he's quite the track athlete, Mr. Ethan Ramirez. We have two throwers here from the winter season. Um, Mr. Aiden Analone and Mr. Eric O. We have short distance runner Jonathan Lamb, mid-distance runner Lemwell Sanchez, and all county sprinter Joel Park. And I know we have many members of our boys winter championship team as well as our girls team. And again, they're outside still competing in the championship. So I would like to also extend congratulations to both all of them on a great season. So congratulations. Good job. I need her. Yeah, we'll do. At this time, it brings me great pleasure to introduce coach Mike Cipellino and coach Mark Audo for boys swimming and diving. There's more. Oh, wait. There's more. All right. Good evening board members,
008Dr. Rogers, Mr. Stuber, and community members. It is my honor to speak to you tonight on behalf of the varsity boys swimming and diving team. This year, our student athletes once again demonstrated what can be accomplished through dedication, teamwork, and unrelenting drive to improve. With 44 swimmers and divers on our roster, every athlete played a meaningful role in our success. Whether scoring in meets, pushing teammates in practice, or bringing positive energy and commitment every day. We entered the season ranked second overall, but through tremendous offseason preparation and a seasonl long commitment to growth, we achieved remarkable success. The team earned its 10th consecutive conference one and division championships, defended our Long Island Challenge title to go two for two, and captured our second straight county championship, our sixth in seven years. We also tied the
009Nassau County record for consecutive dual meet wins at 88, a milestone we aim to surpass next season. But beyond these achievements, what sets this team apart is their passion for the sport and their refusal to rest on past achievements. They push themselves and each other to be better every day in and out of the pool. I'm incredibly proud of these gentlemen and it has been a true joy and incredible honor coaching them. Right now, I'd like to recognize our all county and beyond athletes. First, our all county athletes, Preston Chan, Colin Lou, Victor Pan, Dario Zimbalotti, all Long Island, Nathan G, All County, All State, Jesse Namcun. and all county, all Long Island and all state, Lucas Anne, Aaron Chen, Ethan Chanaa, Eric Lee, Reed O'Connell, and Max Yao. Thank you everyone for your support.
010Thank you guys. Congratulations guys. At this time, I'd like to recognize an outstanding member of our competitive cheer team, Miss Ellie Shankman. She's a a three-year varsity cheerleader, two-year scholar athlete, uh captain, two-time, and earned all county honors this year. I know coach Ivine Lynch is going to miss you very much. Congratulations on another outstanding season. And at this time, I'd like to introduce Coach Steve Cippo to introduce our fantastic gymnastics team. Hello. I just want to thank you everyone for uh all the support that the school district gives the gymnastics team and especially the parents and the board of ed. Thank you very much because without you guys, we wouldn't have a team. This team's been around for only eight years now. I mean, it's been eight years is uh I've been coaching them
011and uh this team especially is is a very uh special to me because I've been coaching these girls during the varsity season and some of these girls outside of the season for the whole year to keep them in shape. Uh we've won the championship for six times in the eight years. So, that's a really big deal. And, you know, it's hard for uh for some team to keep that going when most of the kids graduate out the over the years, but these girls have been working hard, especially the seniors. I'm very proud of them and uh and keeping up the good work. You think this is easy, but these girls work hard all year long to keep in shape and to get going in the teams. And every year we're restarting uh trying to uh
012beat all the teams that are out there. So, you never know when the season starts, but at the end they pul it together and they uh and they got the championship. So, congratulations to them. I'd like to start with Victoria Kelman and Julia Kelman. They're in eighth grade and they're the first year on the team. So, congratulations to those girls. Liv Moscowitz is a ninth grade. She's a first year on the team as well. Charlie Storch is an eighth grader, first year on the team, and she made all league this year for the first time. Maddie Greenberg is all league and she's a 10th grader. Shia Han is a eighth grader who's also a first year on the team and she made all county this year. Ree Calfman is a 10th grader which also made
013all county this year. TA Alexandrew is 11th grader. She made all county this year. She will be my only senior next year. So, she has a lot to uh uh look up to. Uh all state Sophie Bahari, ninth grade. She's first year on this team. She uh placed sixth place on bars at the state qualifier. Leah Chin is my senior. She she was a county floor champion this [Music] year. Alana Slade came in a close second on floor after Leah and she also got the sportsmanship award at the state championship. Vanessa Fulo is my third senior. She is the county bar championship champion, I'm sorry. She plays second place at allound. She plays third place on beam on states, sixth place on bars in states. She is all Long Island and was awarded the Nasso
014County Gymnastics gymnast of the year. And lastly, we we just went to uh Vanessa and I went to a nationals two weeks ago and the team came in second place in the nation. So, congratulations to all these girls and I can't wait till the next season for our seventh championship. Thank you very much. Thank you again. Congrat Congratulations. At this time, I'd like to introduce Coach PJ Moon and Coach Amanda Vatisi for with our boys and girls Nassau County and Long Island Championship fencing teams. [Applause] Good evening everyone. Today we're here to honor the boys and girls all county and all Long Island fencing team and their incredible achievements this year. First I would like to start with the boys team. So when you're hearing your name please raise your certificate. Gavin Burkowitz, Tyson Ang,
015Justin Guo, Oscar Giang, Brandon Lim, Sajjin Sha, Sohan Sha, Jay Suk Singh, Johnny Woo, Jason Zang, and Lucas Zang. Congratulations, boys. Now, I would like to recognize the girls fencing team. When you hear your name, please raise your certificate. Erin Choy, Mickey Fu, Maya Fattomi, Monnique Chin, Alise Young, Alexa Lim, Chloe Lynn, Isa Nyak, Rehea Sud, Autumn Trey, Sophie Wang, Amanda Wang, Rita Yang, and Monona Zang. Congratulations, girls. Just so you know, the girls came in as the fourth seed and they really made a Cinderella story and it was it was it was inspiring to be part of it coming from fourth and then winning it all which has only been done by one other team who actually beat us by one point last year. So now I just would like to also recognize our
016individual all county recipients. When you hear your name, please raise your certificate. Alise Young, Isha Nyak, Sophie Wang, Brandon Lim, Sohan Sha, and Justin Guo. Congratulations. Just two more. I would like to recognize the all Long Island recipients. When you hear your name, please raise your certificate. Sergeant Sha, Sohan Sha, Justin Guo, and Winota Zang. Congratulations. And finally, I want to just recognize the Nassau County champions who took gold this year, and that was Isha Nyak and Justin Guo. And just to let everyone know, Justin Guo was named the uh fencers all the all Long Island fencer uh in Newsuesday, which is a nice experience, a title to have. So, congratulations. Congratulations to everyone. It's been a magical season, and I'm so glad to be part of it. Congratulations, Again, I'd like to thank everyone,
017especially the board of education for their continued support and congratulations to all the athletes. Congrats again. And we are going to uh move to uh the stage for our presentation. So if you want to take a graceful exit, now will be that the time to do it. Or you can stay for the presentation too. always always. Okay. So uh we are going to begin our meeting uh with a presentation and that's going to be uh Dr. Warjek uh who's going to present on the uh SCIO inspire and Dr. Rogers would you like to say a few words? So I'll just set this presentation up um in two ways. The first is uh when we think about the finite resources that we have to work with, one of the ones that's not readily apparent is the
018finite resource of time. We have a certain number of hours uh in every school year where we have uh teachers in contact with students and we want to maximize uh the value of those hours and certainly uh to the extent that lessons are more memorable than the time uh that students spend learning is something that they retain. So we want our lessons to be the kinds of things that students remember for a long time and to the extent that our lessons can serve more than one purpose. they can uh educate students in more than one domain. Those lessons are and that time dedicated to those lessons essentially does double duty. It's a way of multiplying the amount of time that we have with students. So, one of our strategies over the years has been to
019do more interdisciplinary and uh transdisciplinary uh kinds of learning activities with students. Students find them fun and engaging. uh no one tells the students that they're transdicciplinary uh lessons, but what the students realize is that they seem real world, real life, much more memorable. Um that has proven to be a good foundation for the work that we anticipate ahead. And so we're building a little bit on a conversation that the board had uh uh one or two meetings ago where we talked a little bit about uh the new graduation requirements that the state is working towards. uh the board's interest in having a portrait of a graduate of its own and our acknowledgement that the state is still in the process of developing their portrait of a graduate. Uh so what we'll talk about tonight
020is just set up and a quick reminder about where the state stands with their portrait of a graduate work and then illustrate how this uh crosscutting transdisciplinary work that we've been doing here in Sioset is going to set us up from very early grades to be ready for the kinds of shifts that are coming and the kinds of skills that we want our graduates to have that the board has been talking about uh over the course of this last year. So, just uh to start us out with a reminder of where the state's at and the point on the horizon that we're aiming towards, I'll ask Mr. Steinberg uh to just walk us through that and then we'll turn it over to Dr. Wek who will talk about how we're preparing our students even at
021the earliest ages to really aim towards that point on the horizon. David, hang on one second. Let's see if we can get your microphone turned up. um because if we can't hear you in here that you may not be streaming well uh online and we want to make sure that folks at home can hear. Thank you. I think I'm on. I'm on. Okay. So again, thank you Dr. Rogers. Thank you to the board of education again for this opportunity to just keep you updated on uh this the state of the state basically in terms of where they are with graduation measures and to share with you some of the great work that's happening um at our elementary level and getting our students prepared for the future that we know that's coming at this point. Um
022so you'll remember back in um February back in February uh we talked about uh where the state is with their graduation measures and we focused on basically the four transformations that the state uh is looking at. One of which is adopting the portion of the graduate which we'll talk about a little bit more uh in a minute. The move to one high school diploma the sun setting of the diploma assessments and the redefinition of the credits and learning experiences going forward. Um there is a link uh on this presentation to that February board presentation which has all those details on it. But for the purposes of tonight uh we're just going to focus on this aspect of the portrait. I want to give you a brief update before we get into the deeper work. So
023what we know about the portrait uh back in February is what we know today. Um and that being that there are these seven components uh that the state has pushed out um to kind of give districts a frame of what a portrait might look like. But there are some key outstanding questions uh that still remain. Um some of those questions uh not sure what happened to the uh presentation. Oh, it's back. Okay. So, um some of those key questions that remain and outstanding with the portrait. So, I'll back up and go forward a little bit. The state released uh these seven components of a portrait of a graduate to all New York State districts. Um, since that time we have not received any additional information in terms of of definitions of the portrait. That's an
024outstanding question of what these components mean or what the state means by these components. Um and then how will the these um changes um in the components actually force changes in how we're going to assess our students and and just as important is what kind of resources the state going to be providing the local school districts to make the necessary shifts to ensure that our students are ready for uh meeting uh the proficiencies uh in each one of these components. So what the state what the state has done? Okay, thank you. So where where we are um right now as we look at this graphic that was shared in the February presentation in the 2425 school year which is the school year we currently are in um the state was going to finalized the portrait
025of a graduate and we haven't received any notification that what is been presented to us is finalized. So we're waiting on notification on that. what the state has been able to accomplish was to pass an emergency resolution for the exemption of the diploma requirements. Um, starting in this in this school year itself, uh, we are anticipating to get the next uh, information from the state in the 2627 school year when the state's going to release uh, the rubrics and the guidance as to how we're supposed to go about assessing our students in their proficiency of each one of these components. So we have a little bit of time until we get to that point. But as we always have done and what we continue to do here in Scio is we don't wait for the
026state to tell us what to do. We have seen this work coming and we have been working at this shift from a knowledgebased assessment to this skill-based assessment for some time. It's a conversation we've had in this room um you know pretty much this entire year and beyond. And it's work that's been going on in the district. So I'd like to introduce Dr. Dr. Wjik and her team to come up and talk about the work that they're doing in and around their scioaset scioins inspire profiles. So Dr. Wik. All right. Good evening everybody. Uh Dr. Rogers, Dr. Curry Board of Education. Thank you for the opportunity this evening to share with you something that we are developing, have been planning and are excited to share this evening um with you, which is our SCIO inspire
027growing thinkers, learners, and leaders. So, as with everything we do, we think about the district's mission and we think about how we're preparing our students from our youngest kindergarteners um through to our 12th graders for a future we imagine and one that may evolve and that's yet to be envisioned. Um the other thing that we continue to do is think about the board of education goals that were adopted this year. Um, and as we saw, we saw in our AI pilot presentation and again in this presentation, we go through these board of education goals and highlight specifically areas that speak to the SIO Inspire, specifically looking at creating individualized learning experiences, designing collaborative um, opportunities for students, developing a portrait of a graduate that enables all students to discover their passion, fostering an appreciation of
028multiple perspectives. ives as well as creating a strong culture um for to making meaningful connections. So you'll see these interwoven throughout our presentation this evening. At this point, I'd like to welcome up Miss Mi Jang, our principal of South Grove Elementary School, who will give us a little bit of a historical perspective of our curricular journey thus far. Thank you for giving us an opportunity to share with you the work that we have done so far. So I want to take you all in my time machine and take you back to the year 2017. That's the last time Mr. Snyder and I stood together. He's sitting now, but we're standing together at this podium for a board presentation. And what you're seeing here is a screenshot from the presentation that was given that evening. We
029used a tool called Prey, which was all the rage back then, and it beautifully and dramatically zoomed in and out of the big picture overview into the smaller elements, giving you just a touch of motion sickness. So, we used the metaphor of building blocks to frame our curricular work. The goal then was to align the scope and sequence across the disciplines ELA, math, science, social studies, and step back to see the full picture. We asked, how can we connect these content areas in meaningful ways? That question gave rise to our crosscutting projects, rich interdisciplinary experiences that woe learning across disciplines and brought content to life for students. Some of you may remember our earliest crosscutting projects. Some are still in play today, like the Super Coops, where students design and build homes for their baby
030chicks, blending life science and engineering. And speaking of engineering, who can forget engineering fairy tales, where after reading The Three Little Pigs, students built wolfproof homes and tested them with what else but a hairdryer. and of course the tiny homes which Mr. Snyder will speak about in greater depth in the future slides. So over these years these projects have grown into a robust collection districtwide. The list here is but a small sampling of the projects that teachers have used across multiple grades and schools. What we've realized, especially through our recent curriculum council meetings, is that cross cutting has become more than an end product. meaning the projects themselves rather it's become a process. It's a mindset. Teachers are approaching planning through a cross-disciplinary lens and the result is deeper engagement and greater coherence in what
031students experience. And you saw evidence of this during the recent board of education instructional tour and even in our AI pilot work. It's a testament to how these ideas have grown and evolved alongside our teachers practice. So when we look at this continuum of instructional approaches, we see that we fall into several different categories. We talk about disciplinary learning. This is your more traditional approach to learning where subjects are taught in isolation and at the definitely at the elementary level there is a need to teach in certain disciplines. Young children learn to read in isolation first before they can carry forward into a multid-disciplinary approach. As we move along the continuum, we can see how we weave together different disciplines where skills are taught separately but then are weaved together for through a common theme.
032We also see this through interdisciplinary learning as we deepen and and find knowledge in those skills. And we see that our crosscutting learning that has taken place thus far lives in the multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary buckets. But as we engage students where disciplines converge, we talk about Scio Inspire as we move towards a more transdisciplinary approach. And what that looks like and what those changes include are ways in which we use guiding inquiry um where students undertake real world problems. They take those problems and they find solutions. They apply them with the knowledge and skills that they're taught to make meaning out of the world in front of them and develop civil civic engagement. So what is Scio Inspire? So Scio Inspire is a is building on our strong tradition as miss an shared of crosscutting
033learning. It represents the next evolution the 2.0 0 of learning in SIASETID. It's an integrated approach. It transcends the content boundaries and our goal is to nurture critical thinking to think about real world connections, problem solving while looking at the development of the whole child. Its tenants live in inquirydriven practice, student centered instruction, and it cultivates the essential skills that students need to be global citizens. So there are right now two major goals that we're focusing on when it comes to Scio inspire. The first one is about evaluating and identifying a core set of skills or dispositions. And this is going to come specifically through development of our SCIO inspire learner profile which connects directly to the portrait of a graduate and looking at the skills and dispositions we want our students to embody as
034they graduate sasid. So that's the first goal. The second goal is looking deeply and designing curriculum opportunities where global citizenship, personal development, and civic engagement are at the forefront of what we want our elementary students to do. This is going to take place as we identify specific opportunities and then enhance it as we saw in that infographic from interdisciplinary to transdisciplinary while weaving through our learner profile. Overall, we want to ensure that every elementary student develops the goals and essential skills in order to um create a future focused framework for students. So, at this point, I'm going to welcome up Mr. Chad Snyder, our principal of Walt Wilman Elementary School. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I just want to point out in 2017, I had, as Dr. Dr. Rogers can attest I had a full
035head uh head of hair. Um and uh and now I just you know back in the time machine here I guess. So in our research and planning phase um as we were beginning to look at this scio inspire idea and come up with a pathway for transdisciplinary uh learning. We looked at the learning environment in three uh buckets as Dr. Rogers would say. uh we looked at the social emotional uh dis dispositions of students um inquirybased learning and then problem solving skills and how we could kind of wrap all of these together in one woven basket. So we begin a little bit with our New York State social emotional learning competencies. These are super important for us to concentrate on because it has everything to do with a child understanding who they are as the
036uh as as a person and what they can contribute to. um a group project or collaboration. So it really focuses on things like self-awareness, empathy um and responsible decision-making. We moved forward to a thinking model where we wanted the students to remain uh in an inquirybased um approach. And so we we studied the social studies practices uh from the New York State framework. And this really provides contextual knowledge uh and in inquiry practices for students to help them deepen their learning. And then to put it together fully in a package where students could apply all of this information, we studied the work of uh Dr. Tony Wagner uh who was the founder and um co-director of the change leadership group at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. and his work was really focused on uh
037fostering leaders in the 21st century. Uh and his work focuses on things like critical thinking, communication, collaboration and adaptability. All things that uh are um you know necessary not just in a school environment but in any kind of think tank um you know across disciplines. So together when you look at these three frameworks um they're really preparing students not only to excel academically uh but also think through uh inquiry become responsible compassionate leaders that's what we want out of scioaset uh who are equipped to navigate and contribute to you know our global society so this evening we're going to talk a little bit about weaving these elements together uh to create this pathway for transdisciplinary learning um and I get the fortunate um position here tonight to kind of talk about some of the work
038that's put together u by our amazing teachers who on this idea of crosscutting have really developed um a way of thinking uh from which they will funnel and they have been funneling all of our curriculum through. So I'm going to settle in on the tiny houses uh which is a project that um is done throughout the district. And so I want you to imagine uh students being posed with a challenge to create a tiny house. Uh not an actual physical tiny house, but one that they're going to build out of paper and cardboard and such. And so what you what you get out of this is a group of students that are collaborating and deciding where they're going to kind of um fall in terms of their jobs. So you get interior designers that get
039together, right? And these are kids that are putting together like the fluffiest pillows, uh the most incredible drapes that you've ever seen, getting ready to kind of decorate the interior of their buildings. And we have carpenters. They're not wielding hammers, uh yet. Uh but they do have a uh a good grip on their pencil and they they know exactly what to do uh with uh drawing out their buildings and designing their buildings. We have exterior designers and these are students that um probably could make the best Pinterest board you've ever seen uh based on their exterior designs. And then we have students that are thinking about it in terms of real estate. Um and these are students that you know by the end of this project can really sell ice to an Eskimo on a
040hot sunny day. So, it's like a supercharged energy um exposed, you know, project that these kids really get into uh that really uh you know, probably rivals an HD TV series that you might see on TV. So, Miss named and uh you know, pointed out a few of the projects that we've done over the years. Um and all of these projects focus on one thing. It's creativity. Uh, and it's all centered on collaboration and critical thinking skills. So, but this project isn't just a math project. It's not just a science project. It's a civics project. Um, it's a writing project. It's a reading project. It's a project for students to be able to research. Uh, and it's of course um the good old-fashioned creativity is is accompanying this along the way. Students get to re
041research sustainability in terms of what it takes to keep a home um built um renewable technologies, renewable energies. Uh they measure measure and budget uh for their interior designs. Uh they think about um their products in terms of mathematicians and uh you know accountants. They act like future city planners and how they're going to put their buildings on a piece of uh property that it's provided. Uh they're also crafting ads to promote, you know, this their little masterpieces um and thinking about ways to sell the the tiny homes. So, they're marketers as well. So, if this sounds like a lot to you, it's because it is. But our kids are more than capable of doing this kind of work. Um and this is engaging work and this is real world work for them. I'm supposed
042to be clicking as I go here. So, and I'm doing a poor job of it. So, if you look at this particular slide here in social emotional learning, I'm just going to run this project through these three buckets that we talked about. And so, if you think about the the social emotional learning benchmarks, uh we have students that are practicing self-awareness by figuring out what roles might suit them best. Are they better as a creative designer or are they uh you know, a budgets savvy economist? uh they learn self-management skills by keeping the project on track and by helping keeping their their peers and their collaborators on track. Social awareness and relationship skills they have to learn to work together. And one of the skills that we try to focuses on focus on is perspective
043taking which is huge uh for children as it is challenging for us as adults. Uh social studies through civics uh these young architects gather and research from a variety of resources. analyze how local geography affects um how their uh their building and where their building is going to be. We know uh where we live affects how we live, answering big questions like that. They decide on design features, keeping regional climate and community needs in mind. And they pra practice civic engagement, understanding that a house is not just four walls, but it's a part of a community story. And then when we talk about the application skills of this through the work that we studied with Tony Wagner, we look at critical thinking um questioning everything from is my building structurally sound? Can this will this
044roof hold up underwater? That type of thing. Um students are constantly collaborating as I said and you know we know teamwork makes the dream work, right? uh creativity, designing tiny spaces that are both tiny but also functional. And then most important uh is resilience. Students learn that that setbacks aren't stop signs, they're just speed bumps. And so we take a project like this, this is a crosscutting project. All of the projects that we discussed are crosscutting projects. The next step in this is how do we make this crosscutting project which is so vast and so wide how do we make it a transdisciplinary experience and I'm very happy that I didn't get this po portion of the um presentation and I will hand this back off to miss an there is a reason why we
045haven't been asked back since 2017 so using the road metaphor Mr. Snder just referenced with speed bumps and stop signs. Um I'm going to continue on for our punny superintendent, Dr. Rogers. Um so, um projects like tiny homes give us a natural on-ramp to guiding inquiry questions that help students explore themselves and their roles and responsibilities in an expanding world. We've started to organize our foundational framework around our four core questions. Who am I? Who am I in my school community? The school community is generally the first community that students encounter outside of their family unit. Who am I in my broader community? And this is where local partners and organizations play a critical role. Finally, who am I in the world? These questions are intentionally progressive and transcend any discipline. They begin with self-awareness
046and expand outward, helping students make connections between their own experiences and the broader world around them. And while each question may seem simple on its own, they unlock rich opportunities for exploration across both the social and natural sciences. Take tiny homes. Students apply math concepts like geometry and ratio. But as Mr. Cider mentioned, they also explore environmental sustainability, persuasive writing, architecture, and even empathy. And perhaps most importantly, these questions center around the why behind what we teach. When students ask, "When am I ever going to use this?" We can say, "You already are." Whether it's solving problems, designing for others, or understanding their place in the world, they don't have to be grown-ups to apply what they've learned and make an impact. We help them see that their ma learning matters. Now, which brings us
047to this critical piece. How do we keep students motivated? And it starts with knowing them deeply, their interests, needs, strengths. But we also recognize that not every topic will spark equal enthusiasm for all students. And that's where SCIO inspired learner profile comes in. It's our shared vision for the traits and dispositions we want to nurture. traits like adaptability, collaboration, persistence, empathy, and reflection. These are not just the nice to haves, they're essential for success in school and life. Now, between the three of us up here, we've logged um let's say more than a decade, but less than a century of educational experience. You can do the math later. Um, we've seen trends come and go, new apps, new acronyms, but these traits, I'm sure you'd agree that they will stand the test of time and
048technology. So, just this weekend, I received the most lovely email from a parent about one of our kindergarten teachers. The parent wrote, "You're not just teaching our children to read and count. You're teaching them who they are and who they can become. And that's the heart of this work." The SCIO Inspire learner profile isn't just a checklist. It's a compass guiding how we teach, how students grow, and ultimately who they become. So, as you can see, um, especially illustrated through the tiny homes project, we are taking what we currently are working on in our crosscutting concepts and really elevating it through these three lenses. building the foundational framework looking at it through the guiding inquiry and then infusing the skills and dispositions of a learner of a portrait of a graduate through the projects to
049transcend and elevate the work into a transdisciplinary lens. So how have we begun this work? We've begun this work through our elementary curriculum council. Our elementary curriculum council is a team of our educators at the elementary level um interdisciplinary so for across all disciplines um through our special areas music art PE our world language ENL teachers classroom teachers special education all coming together with our administrators um to think deeply about the work that's currently taking place um I would have loved to have put pictures on this slide we were so deeply deeply engaged in the work. We laughed today as we were going through it. We didn't even think to take pictures of the educators working together. That's how deep our educators came together and worked on this project. So, what we began by doing
050was looking at the New York State portrait of a graduate. We examined Tony Wagner's work, his survival skills, and then we took the time to evaluate current curricular opportunities that existed in the crosscutting domain. And we looked at what skills and dispositions were commonly repeated. What do they look like in elementary school students? And what did we feel as a group were most essential to develop as students moved from elementary to middle school. So, we're currently in the process of doing that work. As we look forward, we have some shortterm next steps as well as long-term next steps. Um, so looking at the short term, we're seeing how can we develop the this process, these learner profiles with the broader community. Maybe that's through surveys, through focus groups. We're going to be identifying common themes
051that emerge from this analysis work that we've done. We're going to be aligning the work through portrait of a graduate into the secondary level and then defining those selected skills and developing a common language from K to 12. Long-term we'd like to finalize that Scioinspire learning profile, analyze and highlight curricular opportunities. So looking at the crosscutting projects that we have, how do we develop those? How do we bring those to transdisciplinary learning and then implement them across all grade levels in every elementary school? So those are our next steps. Um, and I'd like to take a moment to thank our principles, our elementary school principles, our curriculum, um, council for the hard work, the deep thinking, the planning of the theoretical frameworks, the analyzing of the crosscutting concepts. Um, when they come together as a
052group, the um, the thinking and the planning and the expansion for our students is really quite remarkable. Um so at this point I'd like to say thank you and um there's anything else any questions? Okay thank you again for the team for putting this together and it's really wonderful to see all the different collaborations between schools and also the primary and the secondary together and then this this this is just as simply amazing. So thank you again and at this point are there any questions from the board for um Dr. Wek? Uh Mr. Astrich. Uh thank you guys for the uh presentation. Actually um my uh question is for Dr. Rogers. So you had telegraphed us this for us a couple of it was a year ago when we were talking about heristic and algorithmic
053thinking in the elementary and middle schools. The thing that I'm curious about is as the New York State standards are changing and we are changing our elementary and middle school learning to be more huristic. It's going to run face first into our algorithmic high school curriculum generally. What is the opportunity and sort of what is the vision on the back end about where secondary can go? Are we thinking of going a third way away between API and a third way? Well, I I don't know the answer to that question yet. And part of the reason for teeing this all up with the the slides that Mr. Steinberg went through is to illustrate that the state is not anticipating giving us a sense of how they're going to evaluate students against those standards until 2627. So
054they're going to release some rubrics. So it seems clear to me at least and yes you're absolutely right. I was telegraphing uh this shift to more heruristic approaches um that the state will have no choice given the kinds of things that are already in those seven wedges of their trivial pursuit game piece um that they're going to have to move to more heruristic kinds of assessments. I think the challenge will be and we've had a lot of conversations about trying to anticipate what an assessment like might look like. Um so that uh if we are trying to assess civic readiness, what might that entail and then how would we kind of work backwards from where that would be in terms of API a third way? Um, I think of that question almost in the same
055way that you would talk about like Mac or PC. Um, not to choose brand names, but just to say both are great ways of getting work done, but if you have a lot of investment in one infrastructure, changing to another comparable infrastructure is a lot of investment and maybe not a lot of return on that investment. So, you know, we're invested in in where we're at right now. We know that the state is going to change what the requirements are. I anticipate that colleges will change more slowly than the state, even though the state has been kind of glacial in its change. So, I think a lot of our built-in infrastructure, our PCs or our Macs, if you will, is going to remain. So I I don't think that uh AP classes and assessments are
056necessarily going anywhere, but I agree with you that they have li some limitations because they are focused on uh knowledge and skills. So they may not align perfectly with what the state is anticipating doing next. But um you know, one thing that we've been doing is listening intently to the conversation that the board has been having over uh these last couple of years really. and listening to the kinds of skills that you've described in your board goals, the kinds of skills you've discussed uh at meetings and in questioning of the presentations that we've brought and we can see where those live and become amplified in the work that we're doing both at the high school level and in anticipation of that work at the high school level now at the elementary level where we have
057more freedom, more degrees of freedom and a trajectory that's leading towards high school. this this clearly the place where we can do that work and I also think we're probably going to learn a lot about assessment uh of those kinds of heruristic skills by starting with younger learners and then seeing how that might translate to the high school. So I wouldn't call this an experiment necessarily but I do think that we're going to learn an awful lot from the work that we're doing here. Miss Falco. Um, first I wanted to say that I'm always blown away by the projects that you guys do. I think that it's such a inspiring way to have the kids learn because they don't realize that they're actually learning. It's just they're so fun and I feel like they're probably
058so engaged and that they love it. And I just I'm always blown away by the things that you guys do. Um, and I'm not sure if my question if it's even possible, but I just I really do think that those project and group things are so great and that they learn without knowing it. Is there any way that that translates to high school classes or is it too hard to do the different ones because everyone has different schedules and it's just it's impossible to get them to line up. But I was just curious if there's any thought or any, you know, way for those kind of um, you know, learning experiences because it just seems like such a a much more fun way to learn than, you know, the traditional way. Before Mr. Steinberg um,
059works his way through that question, I'll point out that there are places where that is already happening in high school and I think a VE is a terrific example of that. Um these are real world projects. They can exist in all kinds of domains. So we have kids that are inventing products to take plastics out of the ocean. So they're thinking about oceanography and ecology and plastic science and uh how many metric tons are they actually pulling out with what they want to do as well as business and how to make this marketable and a product that you could actually sell. So where we get further away from um the kinds of things Mr. was talking about uh disciplinary kinds of classes that exist in a a very disciplinary framework. We can find those opportunities
060and ve just sort of lends itself to that. So I think one of the challenges that we've also talked about at length is trying to look for those opportunities in other aspects. Um, so could you have a class on let's say patent law which would be about the science of the thing that you might be patenting and also the the social studies discipline of understanding law and uh why we have restrictions and uh how that helps commerce. So there are we have sort of high level ideas about how to do that work but it is again to both of your points much more difficult to do in those parts of the high school curriculum that are sort of locked in more rigid disciplinary frameworks but u Mr. Steinberg, maybe you could pick one more example
061to add to VE. Yeah, I'll I'll build off the VE example by going back to the AI projects and when we did the presentation on the Shark Tank project that happened and uh we had the pleasure of going down to the elementary school where the high school students mentored those students in creating their own projects. And there's one project in particular that stood out for me was the students created a vacuum cleaner out of cardboard and motors and things and and it was and and it separated the dust from the pencils that they would pick up in the carpet. Wonderful that they did that project. But what was more impressive is that when we spoke with the fifth graders, they gave us the cell the pitch. They were able to pitch their product. So that
062means they had to stand up in front of us and be able to communicate why we should invest in their product and then they actually negotiated with us afterwards. So it was wonderful to see that a skill that we might have in our mind thought this is only for high school VE students to see fifth graders having the ability to do that. So that stretches our thinking to say oh wait a minute. So so this is going to broaden sort of the opportunity now when we look at sort of high school classes and say where are those project based and those inquiry based um opportunities where do they exist? So a lot of the work that we do at the high school to find those is when we do sort of a review of the
063curriculum and we look at that for where the redundancies and where the gaps exist in the curriculum. So we look vertically and we look horizontally at that and say so where's the space for that? So where we can start to um think about and start to uh sort of um integrate into that curriculum these sorts of um project-based assessments that you're seeing happening uh in in the elementary classroom. Okay. So when you look at VE and you look at the arts and you look at music and you look at all of sort of the elective programming that is sort of happening already there as you know. So we're looking at what's happening in those areas and how do we draw from that to say where does that happen inside let's say a math classroom right
064because that might be the biggest stretch you might think of um you know in science we have the labs so it's inherently project based inquiry based it's already happening in those spaces. So when you look at a place like math, social studies, right now there's been curriculum work that's happening in and around the civic readiness. Um and so there's been a project now that's been start that's actually starting in 9th grade, continuing through 11th grade to help our students earn the seal of civic readiness, right? And where they're going and doing real world projects. So we're beginning to see some of this movement now as we're getting towards some of these uh you know changes that are coming in the future. And there'll be more to come. Yep. No problem. Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Uh,
065Miss Emerson and then Dr. Park. Thank you again. Um, I I you touched upon it a little bit, but I guess the question was, can this be applied not only in one classroom, but across grades and across schools in the same grade and younger and older? And I guess the other I guess comment or as we're building new facilities and expanding our facilities and this is where we're moving to, have we start to think about what kind of layout furniture um would be best suited to to keep going with this? So if this is where the state is moving, this is where we are moving, I want to make sure that we have all the things in place to make it um conducive to this type of learning so that we have the flexibility to
066keep going. So at the elementary level, we're fortunate that our classrooms do engage learners in mult in many different ways with regard to um classroom design and setup. Um I know that in you know recent years there's been a move with some 21st century um furniture but oftent times classrooms at the elementary level are set up so that students are working in small group to begin with. So when we look at like the learner profile and we're looking at collaboration and communication, the design of the classroom is such that it enhances or or infuses that directly in um but it is an you know an area that we will continue to keep focused on as we move into the facilities projects and and continue to work through some of that. We did invest in um
067we were in the process of uh doing a a series of investments in flexible furniture right before the pandemic and then uh that stopped because during the pandemic but in the early going we had plexiglass on desks and the flexible furniture didn't really lend itself to that. We did have um a lot of feedback though and some of the flexible furniture and we didn't go crazy buying it because we wanted to experiment with it and some of the initial things that we tried uh we felt like they were cute and creative but they didn't really they didn't catch on. So you teachers weren't necessarily saying oh this is the next way I want to set up my classroom. So I do think you know your point is well taken that as uh we're thinking about
068these more kinds of collaborative groups group based work as we go through successive rounds of purchasing to be thoughtful about the kinds of things that we choose. So thank you for that. Well the answer to your first question is this happening across multiple classrooms and across multiple grade levels it is. So, uh, Super Coupoops, uh, started in one building, Whitman, uh, great idea of a teacher, um, and Miss McMahon, and it has kind of because it's such a rich learning experience, it's caught on and gone, uh, across the district. So, one of the things that we were doing, and the reason for the presentation in 2017 was we were talking to the board about the behindthe-scenes tool that we were using to to work on these kinds of projects, and it was called the YAG,
069um, which stands for year at a glance. And what we did on the YAG was uh had each of the disciplinary areas and what units were being taught at which time in the year. So I'll make stuff up because certainly I don't have it memorized, but we might be doing the fairy tale unit in English in fourth grade and we might be doing a unit on engineering of structures uh at the same time in social studies. Why do you build houses? Why are houses big or small or whatever? And in math they might be doing something about forces uh what direction forces work in. And from that you get um the engineering fairy tales uh unit that was being discussed and it's successful in one building. A teacher pioneers it and then others say oh
070this is great. I can do three four things with this and I'll put my own spin on it and make it my own. And so we've seen that there are some of these ideas um that have really caught on because they are such rich learning experiences. Kids enjoy them. teachers enjoy them. Um, we have Rub Rube Goldberg machine projects that uh have kind of gone uh districtwide. So, that was our first attempt. Use the YAG to see how things line up and then can you invent a project that goes across as many of those lines as possible and integrates uh as many of those disciplines as possible. And then what's happened is the good ones they scale and they've gone and they're diffusing. So what's happening with this project is to more formalize those projects
071so that it's not just that they're catching on uh in their own right but that we're being thoughtful about uh designing those projects and then also looking at the dispositions of the scioinspire learner essentially your fifth grade portrait of a graduate and then saying let's make sure that we have projects that get at every single one of these dispositions that we want kids to have. So now um I guess the building on of this foundation is becoming really intentional about which projects we're choosing and why and what they add to that learner profile. He kind of answered my question. My question was um as these projects are being created does that check off all this list of social and emotional social study practice everything is being checked off and what although it does enco compress
072many of the items in here. I was just wondering would there be a possibility a child going through certain projects just by chance uh not gain the knowledge of one of the items? Is that possible or do you keep track of all like this project will check off this this this and the child will learn everything in this item? Yeah, I think that's the intentional design is to make sure that we hit all of the pieces of the guiding inquiry. So, as Miss An explained, who am I? And those questions that start out at the younger age and spiral upward as students get in through the years to fifth grade, who I am, who am I in my community will interweave all of those SEAL components, the civic readiness and the social studies and then
073Tony Wagner survival skills and what ultimately we land on with the learner profile. All of that will be intentional and woven through each grade level, through each project that we design to ensure that every student meets every opportunity to engage in those concepts. And Dr. Wick, could you just um walk us all through how the state sets up standards for ELA or math and then how those standards may sound the same, but they spiral as kids get older. And even though you're learning about a character in a book, the expectations for what character means to a kindergartener versus a fifth grader are different. So just walk through how you're intentionally weaving the state standards into this work so that those aren't overlooked either. So as we look and I'll take your ELA example of a
074character as we look at how students engage with literacy standards um and directly connecting it to our guided inquiry. Students at a very young age in kindergarten learn who the character is. Who is the character in the story? They spend the time in that standard identifying after they read a story who the person is in the story. As they get older into first grade, not only do they learn who the character is, but what are some of the character traits that the character might have? How then in the next grade level do they interact with other characters? Why do they do what they do? So characterization is a standard that you would see in kindergarten. Who am I as a character? In first grade, who am I and what are my traits? Who am I
075in second grade? How do I make the decisions I make? What are the reasons behind what I do? And then upward into third, fourth, and fifth. What's the decision making? What's the character challenges that they might face? How do they engage with other students? So that's one example of how the standard of characterization carries through kindergarten, first, second, third, fourth, and fifth. And that is found in all of the standards that students engage in. The guiding inquiry that we were talking about tonight comes from the social studies standards. Those are interwoven. Who am I? That's the most basic understanding of oneself. Who am I with my school community? and so on. As I get older, how do I connect broader to that community, to my community at large, and then how can I make a
076difference? So, the standards are intentional in weaving those principles through. Okay. Are there any more questions? Okay. Thank you again for the presentation. It was very, very informative. Thank you so much. Thank you. Okay. Okay. So I'll just uh sort of end this process with where we began. Um we wanted to give this is rich deep work. Uh it's going to be foundational for us. We wanted to give it uh the time and focus uh to illustrate not only the work that's been going on behind the scenes, but how it dovetales with the work that the board has been doing about setting some direction for the school district. And um you know I think what it what we've been doing uh in listening to the board's conversation and you saw some of this is we're
077building the research base and the research framework behind the dispositions and skills that the board has been talking about is that you imagine in our graduates. So now in addition to our goals, we have the research that informs why and how we'll get to those goals. and we're building on a strategy that has proven successful for us not just because it achieves the standards but because students find it engaging and fun and um that that engagement makes it memorable and that means that they take away more from what they're doing uh as a result of this. So, I I see our uh our work as filling in behind the goals that the board is uh setting for us to achieve. And uh we're certainly not done with this project yet, but we have a a
078really strong start with it and wanted to share our progress to date with the board so you had a sense of where we were going. Great. Thank you, Dr. Rogers. And then we can wait to uh learn more about it as we go along in this process. And this is definitely very exciting. Thank you. All right. meeting adjourned and the next meeting is going to take place on June 9th, 2025. See you then. Thank you.